


Consequence

by Helholden



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Canon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Consensual Underage Sex, Dark, Dom/sub Undertones, Dominance, Emotional Manipulation, F/M, Minor Violence, Older Man/Younger Woman, Possessive Behavior, Pseudo-Incest, Stalking, Submission, Trauma, Under-negotiated Kink, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships, Unsafe Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-07
Updated: 2015-04-28
Packaged: 2018-02-20 06:10:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 17
Words: 77,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2417903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Helholden/pseuds/Helholden
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Consequence supersedes action and inaction alike. This is just an imperfect facsimile of your dreams.</i>
</p><p>Peter Hale is a newly restored Alpha after spending four years in a coma from the fire that left him crippled and disfigured, and he’s looking to begin a pack. Meanwhile, Lydia Martin’s parents die in a horrific accident, and the only family she has left is an estranged uncle from Oregon. In which Peter makes his choices and so does Lydia, but living with the consequences is the hardest part of all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. An End of Innocence

**Author's Note:**

> 1) Disregard the show timeline completely. This fic begins two years before the show and interrupts the entire timeline. Peter has already awoken from a coma, healed himself, become an Alpha, and hunted down and killed all of those involved with the setting the Hale house fire. This fic begins with him considering building a new pack of his own in Beacon Hills, starting with a special someone he intends to groom long-term. Derek is also not present in Beacon Hills during this. Basically, AU this up the wall.
> 
> 2) This probably wouldn't have become the length I'm plotting it if it weren't for the lovely Aureliamix, who basically plays as my muse half of the time and listens to me ramble about story ideas and helps me set avalanches out of snowballs.
> 
> 3) There is no rape in this fic. All sexual acts are consensual for both parties, BUT it is still highly questionable, dark material, and Peter _is_ manipulating and lying to Lydia, who is underage. If that bothers you, this is not the fic for you. It will only get darker as it goes on. Heed the warnings in the tags. They are there for a reason.
> 
> 4) There will be a lot of surprises along the way. Not everything is what it seems, especially the first two paragraphs. Be careful what you read into it. On that note, everything I've left ambiguous as an author will be revealed as the story progresses.

 

_* * *_

 

 _A horrific accident_ , that’s what the papers say.

 

The bodies are torn to shreds, barely recognizable, and it takes the help of dental records to identify the week old corpses found in the woods. The police blame it on a wild animal still as yet identified. There are no theories so far about how they got there in their expensive finery made for dinner dates with wine and a play, but even stranger is how the Martin couple managed to find themselves in the woods like that without their wallets in their pockets, vehicle abandoned in the parking lot at the restaurant.

 

The wife was even wearing a pearl necklace at the time of the attack, cord broken and ivory beads scattered to the wind amongst the autumn leaves.

 

Peter folds the newspaper over in his lap and looks out the window.

 

It is nearing autumn now, isn’t it?

 

-

 

Lydia is a strong girl, but she’s only fourteen, so she sniffles audibly to hold back the tears despite her red-rimmed aching eyes. She looks tough, even standing in the police station wearing her favorite baby pink coat with white fur trim and its matching beanie. The pale colors bring out the flush in her naturally porcelain skin that even her best makeup cannot hide.

 

“Lydia,” Sheriff Stilinski says, resting his hand on her shoulder. Despite his next words, he aims a wary look at Peter. “This is your uncle, Peter. He came all the way from Oregon. He was your closest living relative we were able to find—”

 

Lydia observes Peter with a resentful glare. She remains by the sheriff’s side. “I don’t know him,” she blurts out angrily, looking away.

 

“You probably wouldn’t,” Peter offers with a congenial smile, looking between Lydia and the sheriff to lighten the mood. His eyes rest back on Lydia. “Last time I saw you, you were this high.” He demonstrates by holding his hand outward at the same level as his hips.

 

It’s a blatant lie. He saw her yesterday, and three days before that, and two days before that, but no one’s keeping count.

 

Lydia looks back at Peter, her face still scrunched in displeasure, but her eyes seem more unsure than before. She looks as if she is trying to recall some distant memory of a Christmas or Thanksgiving past, but she was too young and every face blurs in her memory. Her tough façade cracks, and she looks away again as fresh tears well up behind her perfectly curled lashes.

 

She didn’t bother with mascara today. Maybe she was afraid of it running.

 

Peter kneels down in front of her, causing Lydia to cut her eyes at him without fully turning her head. He makes no move to reach out, but he folds his hands in front of himself as he makes eye contact with Lydia.

 

“I know it may seem impossible to you, but I know exactly what you are going through—”

 

“How could you _possibly_ know?” Lydia snaps at him, cutting him off.

 

Sheriff Stilinski’s hand tightens on her shoulder as if to try and hold back her wrath.

 

Peter lowers his gaze. He stares at the floor, wringing his hands together with a nervous sentiment. He knows on the outside he looks lost, hurt, and afraid—all of the things that Lydia Martin is feeling right now, of course. It speaks out in his body language as well as his tone when he answers her.

 

“My wife,” Peter finally says in a softer voice. “I lost her. Four years ago.”

 

He blinks once, and a single tear rolls down his cheek.

 

He doesn’t look up at Lydia or the sheriff again. Peter wants to make it appear as though he is reconsidering this decision of coming all the way to California to adopt his newly orphaned niece, hoping to give them both a fresh start at life. He doesn’t want to appear rash and cut off his chances, though, so he doesn’t make a move to stand up too quickly and walk away.

 

“Maybe,” Peter manages to get out, “maybe this was a bad idea . . . ”

 

While he rubs the tip of his nose with his hand, he takes his time rising from the floor. Even Sheriff Stilinski is filled to the brim with pity. Peter uses his thumb to brush away the tear streak from his cheek, and Lydia is looking at him now. She is looking right at him. Her expression is one of real sympathy this time.

 

“Does it ever get easier?” she simply asks, her hand clutching at the strap of her bag harder than before, so hard her knuckles turn white.

 

Peter stares at her. His vision blurs as he shakes his head.

 

“Not really,” he says. “Some days, though . . . some days are easier than others.”

 

Lydia’s eyes swell up with tears, and there is a heavy weight hanging in the air as she tries to decide what to do next. Finally, Lydia abandons her pretense and runs headlong into Peter, clutching his middle in a firm hug as she cries openly against his jacket. She lets it all go in that moment, all of her strength and all of her walls; they crumble down as she thinks she has found an anchor at last.

 

Peter slowly wraps his arms around her, cradling her head against his chest with the palm of his hand.

 

He catches the sheriff’s gaze over Lydia’s head. Stilinski nods his head in a silent approval, his hands on his duty belt, and turns away to leave them be.

 

Peter waits until the sheriff is out of sight and no one is looking before he closes his eyes and lowers the tip of his nose gently against the top of Lydia’s beanie.

 

Even through her hat, he can smell her strawberry-bubblegum scented shampoo.

 

-

 

The girl has no local family, but she had an uncle who lived in Oregon by himself after his wife passed away a few years back. Peter took the liberty of disposing of the body and assuming his identity. The man was a raging alcoholic at best and had been currently unemployed, living on a small government stipend in a shack in the woods when Peter found him.

 

A few forged documents and a fake but very convincing identification card later, Peter Hale is officially James Peter Wagner. It was only by miraculous chance the man’s middle name was also Peter, which allows him to go by his lawful given name without raising any suspicion. He had to change his last name, though.

 

Peter isn’t very happy about that. That hadn’t been a part of his plan.

 

However, with the new transformation came all of the legal rights to allow him to seek custody of Lydia Martin.

 

Which is, after all, half of the plan.

 

-

 

Peter wants to make Lydia Martin his first beta, but she’s too young for that right now and their relationship is barely existent.

 

He needs to groom Lydia first. It’s a very important part of choosing a beta and making sure the bond is strong enough before giving her the bite. Peter needs to instill in Lydia a sense of trust in him as well as a dependency upon him, so he buys a house too big for just the two of them after he sells her parents’ old house. He does it with the distinct purpose of making Lydia feel alone when she’s inside of it. She will seek him out more often that way, and maybe she will cry more at night, too, because she’ll think he can’t hear it.

 

She’ll seek him out for comfort, or he’ll happen to hear her and go knock gently on her door to make sure everything is okay.

 

All of it is carefully planned, every move he makes.

 

They move into the house, and Lydia curls into her sheets and cries at night when she thinks he can’t hear.

 

-

 

Peter keeps his distance at first. He wants to give the appearance of giving Lydia her space. He hopes it will also inspire Lydia to come to him to close the obvious expanse of empty space between them. They are two strangers after all, dancing around each other awkwardly in the hallways of a house that they both share but do not call home.

 

He makes breakfast in the morning, eggs and toast and orange juice. Lydia eats, but most of the time she just pushes the food around on her plate with a fork and pretends some of it is missing when she leaves.

 

Peter sees her off to school everyday, and he always has dinner prepared for her when she gets home.

 

Lydia sits down, but she scoots the peas across her plate as her chin rests in her hand, a bored expression upon her face.

 

She gets up and goes to her room, leaving those for the flies as well.

 

-

 

The first mark of progress comes when he is watching a movie by himself in the living room with a bowl of popcorn in his lap. The scent of salt and butter wafts through the hallways as well as the laughter from the television set, and Lydia ventures out of her self-imposed exile in her bedroom out of curiosity.

 

She hovers behind the couch, her hand touching the cushions in hesitation. Peter knows she is there, but Lydia doesn’t know that he knows.

 

Finally, she comes around to the other side and plops down haphazardly, trying to show how much she doesn’t care. Peter glances over at her for a brief moment, but other than that, he pretends to return his attention to the movie. Lydia grows antsy too quick, and he sees her look at him out of the corner of his eye.

 

Lydia is on the opposite side of the couch. She scoots closer, dipping her hand in the popcorn bowl. “What are you watching?” she asks.

 

Peter doesn’t remember the name of the movie, but he explains the plot to her. It involves some woman who is tired of always being the bridesmaid. It’s a boring romantic comedy. He only picked it because those are her favorite. Lydia digs in for more popcorn. She laughs out loud, bringing her legs up onto the couch to get comfortable.

 

She leans into his side and reaches for another handful of popcorn.

 

When the movie is over, Lydia is in cheerful spirits.

 

“Hey,” she says brightly, turning to look at him. Her upper body is leaning into Peter’s arm, so her head is shorter than his when he turns to look at her. It is hard for him to ignore the way her breast is pressing against his arm right now. “Why don’t you get us some drinks and I’ll pick out another movie?”

 

“Okay,” he agrees with a smile. He lifts the empty bowl from his lap and shakes it. A few uncooked seeds rattle. “I’ll make some more popcorn, too.”

 

When Peter returns to the couch, Lydia has taken up his corner where it’s warmer. As he sits back down, she makes herself comfortable against his side once more. Another movie begins, and they share a second bowl of popcorn. Peter placed the drinks on the coffee table in front of them, so Lydia leans over his legs to grab her glass. She places a firm hand on his thigh, leaning her weight into it to steady herself.

 

If there is anything inappropriate about it, Lydia doesn’t notice. She sits back up and leans into his side again, her temple touching his shoulder as she relaxes.

 

She falls asleep against him, her hand curled up at his side, her head slipping off of his shoulder and onto his chest. Peter gently frees his arm from between them and slips it around her shoulders, pulling her closer as he places a hand upon her hair and holds her against him with care.

 

Tenderly, he draws two of his fingers down a loose lock before curling it behind her ear. Lydia stirs, but she doesn’t wake.

 

He waits until the movie is over before moving her. He slips one arm behind her back and the other beneath her knees. She lifts easily, and he carries her back to her room. He lays her in bed and draws the covers over her, tucking her in like a child. Despite the seemingly innocent gesture, Peter pauses as he stands beside Lydia’s bed in the dark.

 

His hand strays from him. He lets his fingertips graze over her shoulder as she sleeps. They slip down her arm slowly before they fall away.

 

When he walks to the door, Peter glances back and stares at her on the bed.

 

Finally, he turns away and shuts the door.

 

-

 

“Is there anything you want to talk about?” Peter asks her the next morning.

 

Lydia has been more quiet than normal during breakfast. At least today she is eating. Despite their bonding the night before, he wonders if Lydia is putting up a wall again. She pokes at her cereal, but she takes another mouthful. When she is done chewing, Lydia drops her spoon into her bowl with a _clink_ and stares down at the table.

 

“I miss my parents,” she suddenly admits. Her eyes do not meet his.

 

Peter pauses before eating another scoop of oatmeal. “I miss them, too,” he says.

 

Lydia raises her eyes. “Even my dad?”

 

He smiles at this. “Yes, though he didn’t always like me.”

 

“You married his sister,” Lydia states matter-of-factly. She says this as if it explains everything.

 

Peter is quiet. “I did,” he agrees.

 

“Do you miss your wife?”

 

Peter looks down at his bowl of oatmeal. His appetite is gone. He pushes it away. “I miss having someone,” Peter says instead, not wanting to pretend he is still in love with a woman he never met.

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

Peter shakes his head. “Don’t be,” he tells her. He looks up at her and musters a tired smile. “I initiated the conversation.”

 

“I’m sorry I couldn’t go to the funeral,” Lydia blurts out next. “ . . . Dad wouldn’t let me go. He said I would miss school, but I think it’s because he didn’t want me to meet you. I heard him arguing with my mom about it one night before they left. I stayed with my best friend while they were out of town.”

 

“I don’t blame him. I was a mess at the time. A burgeoning alcoholic.”

 

“Yeah, something like that.”

 

It’s quiet after that, and Peter considers getting up and putting his bowl away. He waits, though. He feels Lydia struggling with the weight of saying something else. He can hear her heartbeat rising with every twist and turn of her hands on the table.

 

“At least we have each other now, right?”

 

Peter looks up. Lydia is trying to smile, but she looks so sad. She swallows past a catch in her throat and reaches across the table, palm up. Peter looks down at her hand. He stares at it. After a beat, he reaches halfway and clasps it with his own, and Lydia clutches him back. Her grip is too tight, but it doesn’t hurt him. Lydia smiles shakily and covers his hand with her free one, rubbing gentle circles into his skin.

 

“You have me,” she whispers, voice cracking as her eyes shine bright with tears.

 

None of them fall until she blinks, and Peter reaches up to brush them away with a gentle caress of his thumb.

 

Her smile falters, but she still smiles.

 

-

 

Lydia doesn’t hide in her room anymore. She spends time with Peter, too. They go grocery shopping together on Tuesday, Wednesday night is movie night, and on Friday she goes out with her friends and all he asks is that she is home before midnight. She comes home later than that sometimes, but always in one piece, so Peter pretends to be asleep whenever she tiptoes by the couch where he is lying down as he waits for her to get home.

 

He pretends to get up eventually and goes to her room to find her in bed. Peter chooses not to hound her about hiding it and pretends he doesn’t notice.

 

Lydia is a growing girl. She needs her space, after all.

 

-

 

He follows her a few nights to see where she goes.

 

She and her friends go drinking sometimes by themselves. There aren’t any boys or parties. Sometimes it’s in a bedroom. Other times it’s in a backyard. They play games to get secrets out of each other, and sometimes they just sit for hours and talk.

 

Peter listens to all of their secrets, but Lydia is very tight-lipped when they prod her.

 

If she has any, she keeps them to herself.

 

Even amongst her friends.

 

-

 

He thinks he can get her to tell him.

 

Peter waits for a night when all is quiet and Lydia is hit by a tremendous wave of emotions and memories that bring out chest-wracking sobs. He hears them clear across the house through the walls with his heightened hearing, and he slips out of bed barefoot in a t-shirt and sleeping pants.

 

When he reaches her door, he raises his hand. Three gentle raps of his knuckle, and he hears a gasp, which is followed by shuffling and then silence.

 

“Lydia?” Peter calls through the door. When she doesn’t answer, he says, “Lydia, are you all right? I heard crying.”

 

He hears more shuffling, the sound of light feet hitting wood, and then padding towards the door. Lydia opens it up in her oversized pajamas.

 

“I’m fine,” she says, even while wiping her eyes right in front of him.

 

Peter gives her a look. “Are you?”

 

Lydia wants to lie to him, but she isn’t very good at it, so she turns away instead. She walks back to her bed without telling him to leave her alone. She doesn’t yell at him like a normal teenager might, so Peter steps slowly inside of her room and closes the door behind himself with a gentle push. It barely clicks shut, and Lydia is already crawling back underneath her sheets.

 

She is barely beneath them before she’s crying again, openly and audibly right in front of him, her head bent forward.

 

Peter crosses the floor. He sits on the edge of her bed, the mattress sinking under his added weight. He places his hand on top of the covers, leaning forward on it. “Lydia,” he says in his softest voice possible, and her hand shoots out, grasping his wrist.

 

She pulls him toward her, wrapping her arm around his, and Peter gets the cue to maneuver himself further onto the bed with his back against the headboard. It puts him beside her, and Lydia clutches his arm as she leans against his side and cries on his shoulder.

 

He puts his free hand on her head, gently strokes her hair. Peter tilts his chin and settles it just above her forehead. He shushes her and tells her it’s okay, but they stay like that for about thirty minutes until the sobs subside.

 

His hand stills upon her hair. He considers whether he should say something to her, but it’s no guarantee she will talk.

 

“Will you stay?” Lydia finally asks in a whisper.

 

He wasn’t expecting that. Peter lifts his chin and looks down. Lydia remains on his chest where her head has now migrated, her hand on the side of his shirt.

 

He wonders if he should protest. Pretend to be worried about propriety. Tell her he isn’t sure if this is such a good idea, but what comes out is, “Sure. Of course.”

 

Lydia slides down his side onto the bed, her hands slipping from his arm down to his wrist. She rests her head on the pillow and holds onto him still. Slowly, he follows her cue and moves to lie down. Peter stays on his back, and Lydia curls up next to him. She wraps her arm around his waist and touches her nose to his shoulder.

 

She clutches him tight and falls asleep like that, shallow breaths in the middle of the night.

 

Peter forgets to get up and move back to his bed.

 

He falls asleep there, too.

 

-

 

When he wakes up in the morning, Lydia’s back is to him and they are spooning, her bottom pressed to his crotch and his arm around her waist, holding her there. Peter blinks away the sleepiness and considers this new position, leaning closer to her neck as he breathes in her scent and tightens his arm momentarily around her waist. His cock hardens as Lydia stirs, pressing further into him. He wants to fuck her. Wants to slip his hand beneath the waistband of her panties and finger her until she bucks against his hand, then roll her onto her stomach and pull her pajamas down and hips up, and fuck her until she screams into the pillow.

 

She’s only fourteen.

 

He opens his eyes, pausing at his thoughts, and pulls away from her. He has always thought she was beautiful, and he has had these thoughts before, but if he acts on them and Lydia gets terrified of him, he will lose everything. All of his plans, it will be for naught.

 

Peter gets up from the bed and takes care of himself in the nearest shower.

 

Her birthday is only a month away.

 

He should do something special for her.

 

-

 

“Do you like it?”

 

Lydia is staring at the small cake with a single candle in it. The cake reads _Happy 15th Birthday, Lydia_ , and so does the card on the table beside it with the key to her first car neatly attached inside, and her eyes gleam from moisture but the corners of her mouth turn upward and she brings her fingers to her lips.

 

She throws her arms around his neck suddenly, and Peter has to catch her. Lydia holds him tightly. “Thank you so much, Uncle Peter,” she whispers into his ear.

 

“I figure it’s never too late to start early,” Peter says.

 

He applies it to all aspects of his life, after all.

 

-

 

Driving lessons with Lydia are easy. Controlling his urges around her, however, are becoming harder.

 

Lydia is growing up, and the clothes in her wardrobe are growing smaller. She’s fifteen, and she’s discovered she has cleavage, so she wants to flaunt it. Her legs even seem longer than before, or maybe her skirts are just shorter.

 

She leans over the counter a lot now.

 

Peter pretends not to notice.

 

-

 

Pretending not to notice equals jacking off in the shower more often, though, and his frustration is building instead of ebbing. One morning, he forgets to close the door all the way, and though the shower is running, Lydia must have assumed it meant the curtain was closed and that would be enough for her to sneak in for a second and grab whatever it is she needed so urgently.

 

He jerks himself too roughly and reaches his finish just as the door squeaks open, and he comes hard as a grunt is ripped from his throat and fills the air.

 

Silence pervades the bathroom in the moments that follow. The sound of the running water is the only thing Peter can hear as he stills, save for the quick beat of Lydia’s heart.

 

She snatches up whatever she came for in a hurry, making too much noise in the process, and hurries out of the bathroom. She never says anything, though. Peter never says anything either.

 

He doubts she would ever bring it up on her own.

 

-

 

“About yesterday . . . ”

 

“All men do it,” Lydia blurts out nonchalantly. She shrugs her shoulders, bites into her celery stick with ranch. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

 

“I wasn’t going to say that,” Peter tells her, looking her in the eye.

 

Lydia stares back for a moment, but then she looks away from him. She lifts her eyebrows again and tries to look uninterested, but there’s an obvious interest in her question. “Why don’t you just date people instead of doing it by yourself?”

 

Peter blinks at her blatancy. He raises his own eyebrows. “I am not interested in dating,” he says.

 

Lydia gets a thoughtful look on her face. She grabs another celery stick, dips it in ranch, and raises it up to her lips as she tilts her head back. Lydia puts the celery stick in her mouth and slowly sucks the ranch off of it, making eye contact with Peter halfway through it. When she’s done, she takes a delicate bite off the tip.

 

“Why not?” she finally asks, chewing.

 

Peter looks down. He pretends to feel ashamed, and he makes sure it shows. “No reason,” he says.

 

Lydia is quiet for a beat.

 

“You should be happy,” she tells him, then. “There’s no reason you shouldn’t be happy.”

 

Peter lifts his gaze. He smiles. It’s genuine. “I am happy.”

 

Slowly, Lydia smiles back.

 

 


	2. Playing House

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>   
>  _Some people will believe anything if you whisper it to them._   
> 

_* * *_

 

The knock comes at midnight.

 

Peter blinks open his eyes to blurry vision. He rubs them and glances over at the clock. It reads in bright blue numbers _12:08_. Throwing the covers back, he gets out of bed and trudges over to the door. When he opens it, he is greeted with the sight of Lydia standing there in one of her spaghetti strap nightgowns that barely reaches past her thighs. This one is baby blue. It shines like satin.

 

“I had a nightmare,” Lydia says quietly, and he can hear her heart hammering in her chest. She wrings her hands in front of her. “Can I sleep in here tonight?”

 

Peter doesn’t tell her no. He opens the door further to let her by, and Lydia walks past him quickly. She climbs into his bed and slips under the covers by the time he manages to close the door. Peter walks around to the other side and climbs in beside her, but he keeps some distance between them and lies on his back.

 

“Goodnight, Lydia,” he says softly, closing his eyes.

 

“Goodnight,” she whispers back.

 

She is fidgety, though, and still for all of fifteen seconds. She scoots closer to him, and a moment later, she slips her arm over his waist and snuggles up to his side. Peter almost opens his mouth to make a comment about how maybe she should remain on her side of the bed, not because he’s actually concerned but because at least it’s good to appear that way.

 

Her arm lifts from his waist to his chest, her hand settling in the center right over his heart. Lydia’s hand seems to develop a mind of its own, her fingers beginning to stroke and glide over his t-shirt in little patterns of swirls—but it’s no sudden development, Peter realizes.

 

She’s testing him. Testing him in a way she can deny if he confronts her about it.

 

Peter considers confronting her about it. He considers it solely for the curiosity of her reaction to him being unhappy about it, offended by it, upset, or even angry. Peter ends up unsatisfied with the course of that direction, though. Lydia would only become upset herself. She might even leave. She may never get close to him again, and that thought irrationally bothers him.

 

The glide of Lydia’s fingertips over his shirt raises the little hairs on his skin and sends a tingle throughout his spine.

 

Instead, Peter reaches over and places his hand on her arm just above the elbow. He grips her gently at first, and then makes soothing motions with his hand. He slowly slides it up to her shoulder and back down again, repeating the motion. Lydia pulls her warm body closer to his underneath the covers, and her fingers begin to trace their light patterns lower on his chest.

 

Instinctively, Peter knows there was no nightmare. The hard beat of her heart in the doorway as she asked to sleep in his room, her wringing hands, the revealing nightgown, and now her touching him and cuddling close.

 

Lydia’s leg bends at the knee, sliding a few inches over his.

 

She didn’t come here to sleep.

 

The ministrations of her hand on him continues, and Peter finds his hand on her arm changing the way it touches her. He glides the back of his fingertips over her skin instead of rubbing her soothingly with his palm, and when he reaches her shoulder, he circles the tip of his middle finger over the strap of her nightgown.

 

Lydia picks up on the change, the signals, and her palm presses down, rubbing a firm arc over his chest. Each touch between them grows more pronounced until Lydia is rubbing the inside of her leg along Peter’s, and when she looks up from his shoulder, Peter turns to her.

 

Their noses brush, hot breaths mingle, and for a moment all is still until their lips finally meet.

 

They kiss as her hand presses more firmly into his chest. Lydia props herself up on one of her arms and leans over him. She moans against his mouth, slides her tongue along his. Throwing one leg over his body, Lydia straddles his waist as the covers fall off of them, and he grasps her hips. He considers letting her lead the way and showing him what she wants, but his restraint is dissipating and he can smell her arousal thick on the air.

 

Impatiently, he slips his hands under her gown and slides them over her hips to find the edges of her panties and pull them down, but his hands slide over firm, smooth skin, finding no outline of underwear. She isn’t wearing any. A white hot throb lances through his gut. She _wants_ this. She _planned_ this. He nearly rolls her below him to pin her down on the bed and fuck her right then and there, but by all accounts she is probably still a virgin, so he holds back.

 

His hand runs up her back instead, hitching her gown up and exposing her ass to the air. He pulls her down by her neck to him then, kisses her deeply on the mouth. Peter savors the moment, the way her scent has filled the room and overloaded his brain. Her hair is all around his face, creating a curtain over them and hiding the way their lips and tongues move together in perfect unison. His hand leaves her neck to pull her hair over to only one side, and the other falls to settle in the small of her back. When the kiss breaks, Peter makes eye contact with her.

 

Eye contact is important.

 

He slides one finger inside of her and finds her so slick that he enters her with ease. Lydia gasps, stilling above him. He starts slow, nipping at her lips between soft kisses, engaging her mouth, so that when she moans as he slides the digit in and out of her, he feels the reverberation against his own tongue.

 

When he slides a second one in, Lydia whimpers and bucks against his hand.

 

Peter holds her down firmly by the small of her back and finger fucks Lydia until she comes three times around his fingers, screaming and practically crying as she chokes, “Please, _please_ , please— _oh,_ _please_ —”

 

She grasps the bed sheets on either side of him with knuckle-white fists when he slips a third finger inside of her. Lydia sinks onto his hand, but she chokes out a sound akin to a sob and her chest quakes above his.

 

“Do you want me to stop?” he asks.

 

She shakes her head and kisses him. Lydia slides her tongue into his mouth, and he responds in kind. She moans and runs her fingers through his hair.

 

When he pushes his fingers deeper, she whimpers softly and clutches him hard.

 

-

 

They don’t talk about it in the morning.

 

In fact, when Peter wakes up in the morning, it’s to Lydia kissing and licking a trail down his bare stomach, his shirt hitched up by the palms of her hands. She slides them lower over hot skin, fingers curling underneath the waistband of his sleeping pants.

 

Realizing what she’s after, he lifts his hips to help her. She pulls them down to his thighs before the sight has distracted her. Peter wonders if she’s ever seen a cock in the flesh before, but then the way Lydia takes him with her hand into her mouth and sucks him as she strokes the base leads him to believe she has had practice at least in this one area.

 

A surge of sudden jealousy shoots through him at the thought, and he thrusts upward into her mouth.

 

Lydia chokes and pulls back, her face red but not reprimanding. Her eyes remain downward, focusing all her attention on his cock instead of his face. He reaches out to comb her loose hair behind her ear, and Lydia raises her eyes to him. She takes only the tip into her mouth this time, sucking on the head. Instead of using her whole hand, she wraps only two fingers around him and squeezes before she moves them up and down.

 

Peter ought to control himself, but he’s angry. As young as he got her, and Lydia has still managed to have some boy’s cock in her mouth first.

 

He wants to know the boy’s name.

 

He wants to skin him alive.

 

His hand slips to the back of her head. He grasps her hair, and he thrusts upward again, pulling her down, too. Lydia chokes; her face becomes red, her eyes water, and she presses her fingers firmly into his thighs. He lets her go, and she pulls off of him completely.

 

For a split second, he expects her to get mad at him and pull away.

 

Instead, Lydia makes eye contact with him.

 

She feels challenged by it.

 

Lydia spits on the tip of his cock, and when she resumes her task, she moves her mouth too fast, her hand too fast. When she cups his balls and kneads them, she sinks her mouth on him as low as she can, but she still chokes and pulls back. None of her enthusiasm leaves with it. She repeats it until she gets better at it and Peter can actually feel his cock graze the back of her throat before she pulls back and coughs. It's enough to make his eyes roll back and his neck arch, and she's inexperienced, but it doesn't matter. Her eagerness more than makes up for it.

 

He comes without giving her a warning, and Lydia chokes on that, too, but she swallows like a good girl. When she crawls her way back up his body, she kisses Peter on the mouth. Even when he tastes himself on her tongue, he doesn’t pull away. He holds her face in his hands and kisses her back until their lips grow impatient for more to touch.

 

Peter sits up against the headboard and hauls her into his lap. Lydia pulls off her nightgown over her head, and he fucks her with his fingers again because he doesn’t have a condom. He starts with two this time, works his way up to three. She’s tight, but he is slow and careful with her in this matter as he was the night before, and she manages to accommodate them better this time.

 

He goes as deep as the second knuckle, and Lydia leans away from him, bracing her hands on the bed as she rides his hand. He enjoys the sight of her body, the bounce of her breasts, and he touches her, runs a hand over her skin, as she bucks into his other one.

 

He makes her come twice, and when he tries for a third time, Lydia finally pulls away, shaking. “No,” she breathes out. “I can’t. No more.”

 

She crawls into his lap, naked and flushed, and puts her arms around his neck to simply hold him.

 

He rests his hand, fingers still slick with come, against her hair.

 

-

 

Peter makes breakfast before school as usual. When he looks up across the table at Lydia, she is naked beneath her nightgown, the outline of her breasts clearly visible through the flimsy material. This one is different from the last one, but it’s just as revealing.

 

“What happened between us the other day,” Peter begins. “We don’t have to do that again, Lydia, if you don’t want to.” He wants to give her the appearance of choice like a responsible adult would do. In truth, a responsible adult wouldn’t have done it in the first place or would have at least shut down the possibility of it ever happening again.

 

Despite this, he already knows what her answer is going to be.

 

She looks directly at him across the table as he butters the toast. Lydia makes eye contact without blinking. She never says anything.

 

Underneath the table, she simply runs her bare foot up along his leg.

 

It’s all the answer she gives.

 

-

 

Lydia misses school that day because instead of eating breakfast, Peter hoists her up onto the table and eats her out instead.

 

It tickles her at first, and she giggles, but then his tongue laps at her just right and Lydia’s giggle dissolves into a deep-throated moan as she lays her head back on the table. Before long, she is squirming, grasping his hair, arching into his mouth, and crying out. He sucks on her clit and teases it, and she comes easily for him. He continues to run his tongue over her, delves it into her, and Lydia trembles as she holds his head. Peter slips two fingers in her as his mouth teases her clit, and he feels her muscles clench tightly around them when she comes again.

 

When he’s finished with her, he kisses his way up her body back to her mouth. Lydia wraps her legs around his hips and hooks her ankles together behind him. As her arms go around his neck, she delves her tongue past his lips and moans when she tastes herself on him. They kiss slow and soft, his hand on her cheek.

 

There is jelly in her hair, and the table’s a mess. They clean it up later after they shower.

 

Of her own accord, Lydia gets on her knees in the shower and sucks him off with an overzealous diligence she usually reserves for her math homework. She hums pleasurably as she bobs up and down along his cock. She looks up at him, drags her tongue along the underside to the tip before she sinks her lips down on him again, filling her mouth with his cock.

 

Lydia is fingering herself when he finally comes over her tongue while in her mouth. She moans, swallowing it whole, and milks him with her hand to make sure she gets it all.

 

Afterwards, he can barely stand.

 

-

 

It’s their usual Wednesday movie night. The television runs in the background as Lydia’s hand wanders up his thigh. Peter looks down. He stretches out to give her better access, laying his head back. Lydia rubs her fingers over his thighs and his crotch until he is hard beneath her hand, and then she crawls into Peter’s lap and straddles him. He puts his hands on her hips to steady her. The noise of the television becomes a blur when Lydia leans in to kiss him, her hands warm on his neck. Peter slides his over her hips and underneath her dress. The dress makes things easier, but her panties are in the way.

 

Lydia lifts herself to remove them and drops them onto the floor. When she lowers herself back to his lap, he rubs his fingers over her, spreading her moisture, and curls two fingers inside of her as they kiss deeply. Lydia moans, a soft, pliant sound, and rocks her hips into his hand. Peter can still hear the television as Lydia pulls the buckle loose on his pants, pops the button, and unzips his fly. He raises his hips to help her get his pants down and out of the way, but they don’t bother removing them entirely.

 

Her fingers encircle his cock, and she gives him two hard pulls. Peter moves his hand out of the way as Lydia positions herself above him. She teases herself with the tip against her wet entrance, rubs herself with him, moans aloud. Peter grips her hips hard, his fingers digging into the flesh. He looks around, remembering the condoms are in the bedroom. He bought some just in case—

 

Lydia sinks down onto his cock without bothering with a condom. It catches him off guard, and Peter hisses softly. His shock is one second of her going through with it, and then all he can think of is the hot, tight pull of her slowly swallowing him up. She is soaked with want, covering his cock with it.

 

An aching moan tears out from her throat, and Lydia wraps her arm around his neck. She throws her head back and goes down all the way until her thighs meet his. He grunts, his hand gripping her back, and she tilts her head away from him, exposing her neck. Peter kisses it, nips at the flesh, licks at her skin as she lifts herself and drags the tight clutch of her body up the length of him with a slow precision before she drives it back down again too hard and too quick.

 

Lydia discovers a new feeling in that, which causes a deep sound of pleasure to resonate in her throat. Her muscles pulse, and she does it again. Peter grasps her shoulders and guides her, and before long she knows how to ride him her way while sitting up—and it’s so, so foolish for him to allow this—no condom—what if he gets her pregnant—

 

—but the tight heat of her around his cock drowns out all of his thoughts as the blood rushes elsewhere. Peter thrusts upward slowly, giving her the majority of the reins, and takes one of her breasts into his hand to knead it through her dress. He rips open the buttons a moment later out of impatience, causing her to gasp, and kisses her chest, catching her nipple between his lips and teeth.

 

Lydia wraps her arms around his shoulders again, using them as leverage when she quickens her pace. By the end of it, he has one arm wrapped securely around her waist and he’s holding her firmly in place as he thrusts up to fuck her while her cries drown out the television set.

 

Peter pulls himself out with his hand just in time, holding her up with one arm as he comes on her ass instead of inside her. Lydia holds still and lets him.

 

She breathes in deeply a few times before she crawls off of his lap, and then she uses the underside of her dress to clean herself off before sitting down. It doesn’t do much good. Lydia still squirms at the uncomfortable feeling of semen quickly drying on her skin, turning cold.

 

“That was . . . reckless,” he manages to say.

 

Lydia shrugs. “I’m on birth control,” she tells him nonchalantly. Peter looks over at her. He didn’t know that. She has appointments, and he takes her to them, but most of it is private and Peter doesn’t force himself into her medical visits. It is one of the few aspects of her life that he doesn’t touch.

 

“Was that . . . were you . . . ”

 

“I’ve never fucked a guy,” Lydia answers frankly, gathering her hair up into her hands and combing her fingers through it. “If that’s what you’re asking.”

 

“And it doesn’t bother you that your first time was on a couch?”

 

Lydia seems to be considering it. “Would you fuck me any differently on a bed?”

 

It’s said with curiosity, not worry about what might have been. She doesn’t even seem fazed by the fact that he’s supposed to be her uncle. Maybe not by blood, but somehow Peter thinks it ought to still count.

 

However, he has other thoughts that become far more prominent right now.

 

Like with that mouth on her, how he wants to fuck her face until she can’t breathe.

 

-

 

He does just that.

 

Peter picks her up from the couch, which surprises Lydia, but she loops her arm around his neck and goes with it. He carries her back to her bedroom—not his, because he wants to mark Lydia’s room with the memory of their liaisons as well. When she goes to bed at night, he wants her to think about all of the dirty things he has done to her in here.

 

When he places her down on her feet, she looks around her room before turning back to him. Peter pulls off his shirt, points at the floor. “Get on your knees.”

 

Lydia is still for a moment. It was an order, not a suggestion. He can tell by the look on her face that she isn’t sure how she feels about being ordered around, but it’s clear she doesn’t like it. Peter closes the distance between them and kisses her softly, causing her to relax again as her mouth opens willingly for him.

 

“Kneel down,” he whispers against her lips, and Lydia slowly nods her head.

 

She listens to him this time. Peter stands while she kneels down in front of him, and she undoes his pants that he fixed back in the living room. Lydia pulls them down, and he steps out of them.

 

He holds all of her hair in his fist as he fucks her face until she chokes, until she can hardly breathe, until her face turns red and her eyes blur with tears. Lydia never once pinches his thigh with her fingers like he tells her to do if she wants him to stop. She does keep her hands there, though, and her nails constantly dig into his skin with a sweet biting pinch of their own.

 

They do, however, stop before he is ready to finish. Peter pulls out abruptly, and Lydia gasps, deep, heaving breaths through her mouth before she wipes it clean.

 

He helps her to stand, and when he touches her between her legs, she is dripping down her thigh.

 

“Fuck me again,” Lydia whispers against his mouth. She kisses him as her arms go around his neck. Peter walks her to the bed. He pulls her dress over her head and tosses it aside, lays Lydia on her back upon the mattress. Her legs hang off the edge, but he moves to settle between them as he spreads them wide—and he drives home into her as he holds her hips and fucks her hard and deep. Lowering one hand to her clit, he tends to her with his thumb during each thrust until she is practically crying as she hollers at the ceiling, overwhelmed with the sensations he is causing in her.

 

Lydia has tremors afterwards. They last a good thirty minutes or so. He kisses a soft trail up her body to her breasts and then her lips. Peter places a gentle kiss in the center of her forehead last and brushes his hand over her hair.

 

He lies down beside her.

 

With one of her arms trapped between them, Lydia wraps the other one around Peter and hooks one of her legs over his knee. She holds him on top of the bed, and he holds her back.

 

She cradles him close and falls asleep.

 

-

 

They can’t seem to keep their hands off of each other.

 

Lydia wants sex all the time. Maybe her libido is high, but she always wants it. It happens at random times and in random places around the house. Sometimes it’s at night, but it also happens in the morning and in the afternoon and during the evening. Sometimes it happens in the shower, on the counters, on the floor, and the couch.

 

Peter bends Lydia over the kitchen table and fucks her just before she has to go to school. He doesn’t pull out, so when he sees her off, there is come dripping down her thigh. She walks away awkwardly, trying to avoid it because there was simply no time to wipe it off.

 

He gets off on the thought.

 

Peter does everything to her that she wants, everything that she likes, and Lydia likes to give as much as she receives. The only thing she hasn’t agreed to is anal, but he tried a finger inside of her once and Lydia didn’t like it, so they didn’t go further.

 

The only thing Peter doesn’t do is bite her.

 

Peter thinks she is ready, but he has to be sure. He needs to be sure. He needs to know without a doubt that this is the moment before he does it.

 

And so he waits.

 

-

 

Eventually, Lydia’s sexual appetite calms down.

 

He imagines it was the teenage hormones discovering the pleasure of sex for the first time that put her over the edge. She didn’t bleed her first time, and he didn’t hurt her. He always made sure she was ready, and he made sure she got off.

 

He is lucky he isn’t human, or she would have worn him out by now at his age.

 

When their relationship slows down again, it comes out feeling different than it felt before. Lydia’s blunt sexual curiosity turns into a calm, quiet affection. She sits close to Peter on the couch, falls asleep on his chest, and sometimes also in his lap. Lydia curls up to him at night in his bed where she now mostly sleeps, forgoing her own room, her nose often pressing into his shoulder where she can breathe him in.

 

She leans into his side all the time when she tries to read what he is reading. She hugs him, lingering hugs, and she always touches his hands and arms whenever he is near to her. She touches his back, too, and sometimes his waist. She likes to sit behind him, straddling his waist and running her fingers through his hair, no matter what he is doing.

 

Lydia trusts him, wholly and completely. She relies on him.

 

He is her Alpha.

 

She may spread her legs for him and let him fuck her as she screams his name into the pillow—sometimes it’s _Peter_ and other times it’s _Uncle Peter_ , but he comes harder when it’s the latter—but the real tremble comes when she sits flush against his back as he reads the newspaper and she runs her fingers through his hair and along his scalp. She likes to pull his hair into her hands and attempt to make little braids in it whenever he grows it out.

 

Peter pulls them out, but Lydia only laughs and leans over his shoulder. When he turns to look at her, she kisses him on the nose.

 

“Well, _I_ liked them,” she says.

 

“I don’t,” he replies.

 

“I’ll just put more in later,” she tells him, resting her chin on his shoulder.

 

“You could try,” he says.

 

“I will succeed,” Lydia whispers, and he doesn’t argue with her because it makes her give off an amused huff as she wraps her arms around his middle and presses her nose between his shoulder blades and smiles, and he has to be honest with himself.

 

He really likes that.

 

-

 

He knows she’s ready.

 

He knows it’s time.

 

-

 

“I have a gift for you,” he murmurs against her neck. Lydia giggles.

 

“What kind of gift?”

 

Peter pulls back far enough to look her in the eyes. He draws his fingers across her forehead, brushing her hair to the side. The longer he stares, though, ends up unnerving Lydia. In all of three seconds, the confidence leaves her and she looks fourteen and scared again. Her eyes avert away.

 

“Aren’t you going to tell me?” she asks, but her voice is unsteady. It cracks under the pressure.

 

Peter cups her chin and brings her face up to make eye contact again. “Don’t you trust me?” he simply inquires, a single digit trailing a path across her cheek.

 

Lydia breathes out slowly through her mouth. She smiles shakily and nods. “Yes, of course,” she tells him. Her admittance of trust sets his bones on fire.

 

He kisses Lydia, then, a deep kiss to hush the questions in her head, to make her submissive and docile, to edge in his control. Peter kisses his way down her neck to her collarbone, dragging his lips further down her chest. He teases her nipple between his teeth before sucking on it, and then he moves lower until he’s on her stomach with his lips. At last, he reaches her hips.

 

Lydia reaches out and runs her fingers through his hair, thinking—perhaps—of something else entirely.

 

He opens his mouth, canines elongating and teeth growing out to a finer, sharper point.

 

When he sinks them into her side, Lydia screams.

 

 


	3. This Fantasy and Fallacy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>   
>  _It’ll have to drown me before I can breathe easy._   
> 

_* * *_

 

Peter calls her school and tells the receptionist that Lydia is sick with a virus and she’ll be out for the week. He says she’ll return with an excuse, and the woman politely wishes Lydia well and hangs up.

 

Lydia is bedridden, which isn’t natural, but she also isn’t bleeding black blood. It is the only good sign, and Peter tends to her in bed, but she drifts in and out of consciousness. Whenever she comes back, she cries and tries to weakly fight him, tries to crawl off the bed, but Peter gently hauls her back up and shushes her and strokes her hair and tells her everything is going to be all right.

 

 _I am going to take care of you_ , he says, but she only cries more and rolls away from him.

 

He feeds her soup with supplements to make her stronger. Every hour he checks her temperature to make sure it stays steady with no sudden spikes. Peter even helps her to the bathroom and runs a hot bath for her, but she flinches when he tries to remove her gown and she ends up clutching it tightly to her body, so Peter lets her sink into the bath water with it still on. He washes her hair and arms and legs, and she calms down as he cleans underneath her nails.

 

“Lydia,” he says, but she doesn’t answer him, so he takes her chin into his hand tenderly and turns her chin to face him. “Lydia—”

 

She blinks at him like she doesn’t recognize him.

 

All at once, Peter finally feels something akin to rage. It’s been so long, but there it is, buried deep. He lets go of her and makes it two feet across the bathroom before hollering in fury and slamming his fist into the wall. His hand busts clean through the wood. In the tub Lydia jumps, but Peter doesn’t notice. He pulls his hand from the wall and stares at it, flexing his fingers. But then he clenches his fist and whirls around, driving it into the bathroom mirror.

 

It shatters, falling into the sink covered in his blood. The minor cuts on his skin heal quickly, but the blood remains on the shards in the sink.

 

When he turns around at last, Lydia is huddled against the wall in the tub. She looks frightened, absolutely terrified, and he approaches her. Lydia turns toward the wall and wraps her arms around herself.

 

Peter bends over and opens the drain, letting the water out. He snatches a towel from the rack and wraps it around Lydia, scooping her out of the tub.

 

He carries her back to her room and dries her off. She remains as still as a statue throughout it. When he tries to peel off her wet clothes in order to put dry ones on her, Lydia yanks away from him. Peter clenches his fists, but he gets up and brings her fresh clothes and places them on the bed right in front of her. “Please, dress,” he tells her, and then he leaves.

 

He goes downstairs to pace, to think.

 

She shouldn’t be sick unless her body rejects the bite, but if her body is rejecting the bite, there would be signs. Lydia is exhibiting none of them. There is also the possibility of immunity, but he thinks he would have picked up on that if it were there. Lydia also exhibits no reasons to be immune to accepting the bite. It is an exception granted only to other supernaturals. They cannot become werewolves, but Lydia is human.

 

 _Isn’t she?_ whispers an uncertain voice in his head, and Peter grits his teeth.

 

When he returns to her room upstairs, he opens the door and Lydia comes at him with a shard of broken glass in her raised fist. Peter reacts quickly, snatching her wrist without twisting it, and pulls her by her waist against his body with a firm grip. He wrestles the glass away from her, but it slices her hand and she screams. Hissing through his teeth, he throws the bloodied shard across the room.

 

He grabs her hand, turning it upright to look at it. Lydia is bleeding badly.

 

Peter guides her back to her bed despite her crying and sits her down. He rips a piece of cloth off of the edge of his shirt. Expertly, he wraps it around her injured hand, looping it before tying it gently in place. He then takes her injured hand back into his, using his power to draw the pain out of her wound. Lydia feels it leaving her, the look on her face turning into awe. She isn’t crying anymore.

 

The tear streaks are still on her face, though.

 

She looks at him, then. She looks at him as if she finally sees him again. There are questions in her eyes, things she doesn’t fully understand, but she favors a more logical and sensible approach over all of the rest.

 

Lydia tries to keep a straight face and be strong, but her lips tremble and her eyes water. “Are you going to hurt me now?” she asks him, too calmly, and then she’s sobbing all over again. “Please, I didn’t mean to—I was just scared—I promise I’ll be good if you just—if you just don’t _hurt me_ —”

 

Her voice cracks, breaks, and Peter realizes with the shock of dead weight that he hadn’t expected this reaction out of her.

 

Slowly, he lets go of her hand. He looks away.

 

He doesn’t know how to fix this.

 

Peter looks back at her. “Why would I hurt you?”

 

Lydia pauses. She blinks, another tear falling down her cheek silently. “Is this a trick?” she asks.

 

Peter shakes his head. “No tricks,” he says.

 

Lydia closes her mouth. Her throat bobs as she swallows. “I tried . . . ” She looks across the room at the shard of broken glass. “I tried to stab you with the glass—”

 

Peter lifts his eyebrows momentarily. “Yes, you did.”

 

“ . . . And . . . you don’t want to hurt me for that?”

 

“What do you think I am, Lydia?” Peter asks, turning to look at her. He narrows his eyes. “That I would want to _hurt_ you? What for? Why?”

 

Lydia is taken aback by his questions. She actually leans away some, too, her look of shock as plain as day. “You . . . ” She tries to say it, but she can’t find the word. She knows what happened, but she still doesn’t understand any of it. “You . . . ”

 

“Bit you, yes,” Peter finishes for her. “I did, but that wasn’t to hurt you.”

 

Lydia is horrified by his response. “It _hurt_ ,” she throws back at him, regaining at least some of her courage.

 

“Yes, but that was not the _point_ ,” Peter says, making eye contact with her. He is growing agitated, but he tries to keep his temper under control. “The bite hurt. It always hurts, but the point of it wasn’t _to_ hurt you.” Peter leans closer to her, and for once, Lydia doesn’t flinch or pull away. She stares straight at him. “The bite is a gift. I can’t explain it yet, but it will all make sense soon. I promise.”

 

Lydia opens her mouth. Slowly, she shakes her head. She looks faint, tired, and ill. All of them are affecting her brain. Lydia can’t think straight. She can’t make any sense of the things he is saying. “I don’t understand . . . ”

 

“Do you want to hurt me?” Peter asks her suddenly as he gets up from the bed, looking around the room for an object, a weapon, that isn’t glass. “Will that make you feel better?”

 

“I don’t—”

 

Peter leaves the room without warning, takes the stairs two at a time, and strolls into the kitchen to grab a smooth knife from the knife rack. He comes back to her room and holds the knife handle out towards Lydia.

 

“Go on, take it,” he says.

 

She stares at it, then looks up at him. Slowly, Lydia reaches out for the knife and takes it.

 

Peter kneels down on the floor, holds up his arms. Each one is bent at the elbow. He tilts his head back, chin up for good measure.

 

“Go on,” he tells Lydia. “Do whatever it is you think you need to do if you’re so convinced of what I am.”

 

Lydia stares at him. She looks at the knife, looks back at him. The knife trembles in her hand as she grips the handle and raises it up. Her face falters. Lydia looks like she wants to cry again. She nearly drops it, but then she finds the strength to grip it tight and get off the bed. Lydia moves slowly in her condition, but she gets up close to him and presses the blade against his throat.

 

Peter has the strength and the speed to stop her at any moment, but he doesn’t. She digs the blade into his neck, and he simply closes his eyes as he moves his hands behind his head carefully so as not to startle her into making a rash move. He tilts his head back further, baring his throat to her. He knows she won’t do it. He knows her.

 

He knows.

 

In less than five seconds, the knife clatters to the floor.

 

Lydia stumbles backwards. She nearly falls, but Peter reacts quickly and catches her. One of her arms clutches around his neck for something solid to grasp onto, something to hold that isn’t air. Lydia sobs against his chest, weakly pounding her fist into it as her tears soak into his shirt. It is a physical manifestation of the war inside of herself. On one hand, she has been conditioned to seek him out for comfort, to cry on his shoulder when things get tough because he will show her what she believes to be unconditional kindness and support, but on the other hand, where does she turn when he is the one causing her pain?

 

Peter shushes her, runs his hand over her hair until her sobs subside and they are sitting on the floor with Lydia in his embrace as he rocks her back and forth. She eventually stops crying entirely, her head resting against his chest as he strokes her hair.

 

She stares outward numbly, though he doesn’t see.

 

He picks her up and returns her back to her bed. Peter combs her hair away from her forehead with a single digit, leans forward to kiss her on the forehead as his fingers still linger against her temple. When he pulls back, he hovers over her for a moment and says, “Get some sleep. I promise you’ll feel better if you get some rest.”

 

Lydia’s jaw tightens imperceptibly, but he sees it. It’s gone within a second. She nods her head. “Okay,” she whispers.

 

Peter takes the time to collect the broken shard and the knife before he leaves and closes the door behind himself.

 

He has no doubt which side she will be on when all of the dust settles.

 

-

 

Lydia remains quiet for the first few days after that. Peter checks her vitals each day. He makes her breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He washes her clothes, tends to the chores, and insists on fixing little things for her. When she comes down one day without bothering to brush her hair, he gently sits her down in the kitchen and brushes it for her. Peter runs his finger along her ear afterwards, and where Lydia used to respond, she is immobile.

 

He slowly pulls his hand away and thinks maybe she just needs more time.

 

She sleeps. She sleeps and sleeps and sleeps.

 

In the middle of the night, Peter catches her sleepwalking and guides her back to her room. He sits against her headboard and strokes her hair, stays with her until she remains in bed and stops trying to get up, and when she asks why can’t she walk, he tells her, “Because you need to sleep first, sweetheart.”

 

“Oh,” she breathes out, and shortly afterwards, she is back to sleeping normally.

 

Peter leaves, then, to give Lydia her space.

 

-

 

She screams in the shower.

 

He hurries to it, but the door is locked. Lydia is still screaming inside. Peter rams his shoulder into the door and busts the lock, finds her screaming as she stares at the bottom of the tub as the shower runs, but nothing is there. He grabs a towel and wraps her in it, turning off the water, and walks her out of the bathroom.

 

When he finally gets her to speak, Lydia manages to stutter that her hair was falling out and clogging the drain and the water turned to mud and kept rising.

 

Peter saw none of those things.

 

He is concerned about what they mean.

 

“I’m going to go see someone,” he says, thinking he needs to find this out sooner rather than later. It may explain why she is not yet exhibiting any of the traits of a beta. He stands up from the edge of her bed. “Lay down and get some rest—”

 

Lydia’s hand shoots out and grabs his wrist, her eyes opening wide. “No, please, don’t leave me alo—” She cuts off halfway through the word, shock entering her features.

 

Jerkily, she pulls her hand away from his.

 

Peter feels the sting, but also sees the opening. He sits back down slowly, even as Lydia averts her eyes.

 

“I’m going to take care of you,” he tells her. “You may not believe that now, but you’ll see.”

 

Lydia swallows past a lump in her throat.

 

“Would you like to stay in my room while I’m gone?”

 

Peter recalls reading something about familiar scents being calming, and maybe she would find the scent in his room more relaxing than her own, which lacks a distinct aroma to her since its her own. Lydia seems to be considering it, much to his surprise and muted delight. Finally, she nods her head.

 

Peter guides her to his room. He leads her to the bed, and Lydia sits down on the edge. She looks exhausted, and there are dark circles under her eyes. She doesn’t lie down, though. She sits upright. She stays still.

 

“I’ll be back soon,” Peter tells her. Lydia looks up at that.

 

He leaves, but he doesn’t lock Lydia in his room. The last thing he needs to do is make her feel imprisoned by him. Their trust hangs on such a delicate thread. He gives her all of the space she could possibly need or want, but she barely touches any of it.

 

He doesn’t think she will try to leave the house just yet.

 

Peter locks the front door behind himself when he leaves, though.

 

-

 

When he returns home, it’s late. Peter pauses outside, looking up at the sky. It’s a deep cobalt, the color just before nightfall. The full moon is a few nights away, he realizes, as he sifts through his keys for the one to the house.

 

Once he makes it inside, he heads upstairs to his room.

 

He finds Lydia asleep in his bed, lying on her side and facing the window. She is underneath the sheets, but the blankets remain at the foot of the bed.

 

Peter undresses, pulling on a clean t-shirt and fresh boxers, and crawls into bed behind her. He realizes immediately why she isn’t under the blankets—her skin is hot to the touch. It’s a good sign, actually, that she is getting warmer towards the full moon. He puts his arm around her waist and, for one pleasant moment, can recall how things were before the bite—before Lydia’s trust in him was something for her to question. When things were simpler and she believed him.

 

He hadn’t expected her to rebel against him so fiercely. He hadn’t expected her to liken the bite to an attack, nor had he expected her to be so torn up over it. The bite was painful, sure, but Lydia acts as if he had done something horrendous to her—as if he would cut open her back at the spine and slowly skin the meat from her bones one claw at a time.

 

He gave her a gift.

 

She treats it like a disease.

 

He reaches up from her waist to her hair and brushes his hand soothingly over it. While he found out nothing of value tonight, in a few days he will have all the answer he seeks. Whether tonight or tomorrow, it makes little difference. He can wait. He has patience.

 

Peter kisses the back of her head, closing his eyes. Lydia stirs, pressing closer into his body and his embrace. _Only in her sleep_ , he thinks. In the dark surrounded by a scent that she has long come to associate with safety and peace, she stirs further and rouses, seeming to have forgotten all about the trauma of the last few days. When Peter returns his arm to her waist, Lydia settles her arm just over his and rubs her hand down the length of his forearm. She seeks out his hand, threading her fingers with his own and clutching him gently.

 

He should have thought of this sooner. He hadn’t thought she’d feel safer in his room. The bite happened in her room, after all, but it is belated thinking on his part.

 

Lydia, however, is seeking more than just comfort.

 

She presses into him, arching her back. She flattens her hand against his knuckles and rubs her palm over them, pushing his hand down the side of her body as she rolls her hips. Peter leans into the crook of her neck and slips his hand out from underneath hers, hooks his thumb in the waistband of her pajama pants and panties and pulls them down. He feels himself growing hard at the friction between them, the way she rolls her hips backwards into his, and he pushes her pants lower until Lydia kicks them the rest of the way off.

 

He fingers her only to find her already wet—from a dream she had, perhaps, he isn’t sure—but he withdraws his hand and removes his boxers, kicking them off. Lydia moans, spreading her legs, and rolls her hips back toward him again. Peter gives himself a couple of strong pulls and positions himself behind her. He parts his lips, eyelids fluttering, as he pushes into her; she fits him like a glove, hot and inviting, as she gasps.

 

He nuzzles her hair, hooks his hand beneath her thigh to lift her leg some more. He thrusts deeper. Lydia whines low in the back of her throat and rocks into him, stretching her head back as she arches her back. He buries his face into the crook of her neck and begins a tantalizingly slow rhythm. Sometimes he nearly pulls out all the way, just to push back in slower than before. Each time, Lydia falls still and gasps, letting herself feel it.

 

Eventually, she reaches behind herself to place her hand in his hair. Peter settles her leg over his own and lays his hand on her stomach, holding her against him as his thrusts quicken. Her fingers grip his hair; his hand slides lower to tend to the spot between her legs, and she arches her back firmly, her moans quickening in succession as her muscles grow taut, and he gives up trying to hold back and pounds into her until she is clenching and coming all around him as she grasps his hair and cries out.

 

Even after she’s had her climax, he continues with the same rough pace until he’s had his as well.

 

The room smells like sex afterwards, and he’s sweating. He pushes his hair back from his forehead, runs his hand over the shoulder of her nightshirt as he tries to remember how to breathe steadily. Lydia is peaceful, sated, and she doesn’t say anything. Peter kisses her shoulder and runs his hand along her arm.

 

With the full moon so close, he wonders if tonight isn’t just a reflection of that.

 

As much as she has been fighting him, tonight Lydia accepted him—gave in—sought the concourse of their bodies instead of pushing him away. Peter thinks it is a positive sign, a sign she is seeking her Alpha, and she knows it is him. As a female, the rules will be different for her than they would be for a standard male beta. A male might challenge him, might fight back and question his leadership, but a female beta with the proclivities towards the opposite sex will submit more easily to him.

 

It is the reason why he sought out a female first instead of just biting the first boy who seemed like a good candidate to become one of their kind.

 

The most stable pack is built on a strong Alpha, but an Alpha is even stronger with an unwavering mate by their side. It shows they can provide, protect, and endure. Peter never put much stock into the idea until recently, and coming out of a coma changed his perspective on many things. He desires Lydia Martin, yes, but he chose Lydia because she is as beautiful as she is extremely intelligent, and he knew, given time, she would come around.

 

In a few days it will be the full moon, and he will run with Lydia under the stars and show her exactly what it means to be in the favor of an Alpha.

 

He runs a hand over her messy locks, combing it away from her face, and plants a kiss on the shell of her ear.

 

She doesn’t understand it just yet, but she will.

 

Peter closes his eyes and presses his nose against her hair, listening to her breathe.

 

She will.

 

-

 

Lydia is sick in the morning.

 

She spends it over the toilet in the bathroom until she is crying and her throat is raw.

 

When he knocks on the door and asks if she is all right, she tells him to go away. He hears her whining, her sounds of pain, and eventually, she runs a shower. He stays nearby to make sure nothing happens. Lydia emerges from the bathroom, showered and clean, with a towel wrapped around her body.

 

She pauses when she sees him in the hallway.

 

“How are you feeling?” he asks.

 

Lydia is quiet. She averts her eyes. “Like I can’t keep anything down,” she finally admits, ceasing to be hostile. Peter sees something interesting in her expression, then.

 

Shame.

  

It’s a curious thing.

 

Peter pushes off of the wall and slowly approaches her. He places his hands on both of her arms, and Lydia glances up. “How about you put on some clothes,” Peter suggests, “and when you come downstairs, I’ll have something fixed for you that you can eat.”

 

Though she is still at first, Lydia finds the strength to nod her head.

 

He leans in to give her a lingering kiss on the forehead, and then he pulls away. Peter looks at her afterwards, smiles, and the corner of Lydia’s mouth seems to twitch slightly upward, though she doesn’t fully reach it.

 

He goes downstairs to fix her something to eat.

 

Lydia is still standing in the hallway when he descends the steps, staring after him.

 

-

 

On the evening of the full moon, Peter goes to Lydia’s room to check on her.

 

He finds her missing.

 

Instead of panicking, he is strangely calm. Peter checks the whole room to make sure she isn’t in it. He looks under the bed as well as in the closet. When it’s clear she isn’t there, he leaves to check the rest of the rooms on the second floor. His room is also empty of her presence.

 

“Lydia!”

 

He calls her name throughout the house. There is no answer.

 

“ _Lydia_ _!_ ”

 

He begins to assume the most likely outcome: she shifted and ran for the woods.

 

He tears through the house towards the front door. He runs outside, skidding on the concrete, looks both ways, tries to pick up on her scent in the air but smells nothing, and runs down the sidewalk towards the trees in the far distance.

 

When he is past all of the houses and out of sight of people, the concrete turning to dirt turning to grass, Peter finds himself shifting under the silver moonlight until he is running on all fours as he tears through the first line of the trees. Branches break and foliage crunches, and he throws back his head and howls to the moon.

 

It’s a call to see if Lydia answers him, to see if anyone answers him, but he seeks her in particular on this night and no others. If it is her first night as a werewolf, then he must spend it with her. They have to make their first kill together.

 

He has to seal the bond.

 

Peter skids to a halt in the dry brush, listening attentively as he turns his nose up to the air and breathes deep.

 

He hears no howl in response to his own, but he smells her scent on the breeze through the rustle of leaves—the distinct scent of _Lydia_.

 

It’s her blood.

 

 


	4. Make Me Pay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _But if it all was true, that I went mad because of you._  
> 

_* * *_

 

He tears through the woods, following the scent of her blood beneath the moon.

 

It isn’t strong, but his senses are pushed into overdrive with the mere suggestion of it, twigs snapping beneath heavy paws as he runs. He freezes suddenly after a long sprint and looks around in both directions as deep breaths fill his nostrils. In the newfound quiet, the sound is the loudest thing surrounding him.

 

Past the trees ahead, he spots the pale vision of her wandering in the woods. Her unruly strawberry-blonde hair is a tangled mess of leaves and curls, and she puts out her arms to feel for her surroundings as she stumbles through the bracken. It isn’t natural behavior, not for a newly turned werewolf.

 

Something isn’t right.

 

He takes off toward her, loping past branches that crack loudly as they snap back into place, until she looks back and sees him.

 

She screams and runs.

 

He chases for a moment until he realizes what caused her to run in the first place, and then he halts. It takes all of his willpower, but he shifts back into his human form. Looking down at his hands, Peter flexes his fingers until the claws retract back to blunt nails. He glances up in the direction he last saw her. In the distance he can still make out her movement, and he can hear the faint rush of water over rocks.

 

He memorizes the trail of her scent, but has to go back for his clothes.

 

Peter hastens, then, as fast as his human legs can carry him until he’s back at the last place he saw her and he spots the bank of a small creek in the forest. It sits at the foot of a mossy hill, curving into it. A crag juts out above the water, hanging with overgrowth, and Peter can see her crouched in hiding beneath its shadow, her back pushed against the rock. Her slender fingers grab for purchase on either side of her in fear.

 

He pretends not to see her, but calls out to her. “Lydia!” He pushes past the trees and bracken, making audible noises as he goes. “Lydia!”

 

She hears him, freezing at first, until she recognizes his voice. She pushes herself into a bent standing position and emerges from the shadow of the crag.

 

Peter pauses mid-walk, pretending as if he has finally seen her at last.

 

“Lydia—”

 

“Uncle Peter—” she chokes out, and then she’s running towards him. She throws her arms around his neck, grasping onto him as hard as life allows. He holds her back, steadying the shaky balance of her legs. “I was so scared. I saw a beast or a monster. Some kind of bear or a wolf, I don’t know. It chased me, and I ran—”

 

Peter knows exactly what she saw. Him. He lifts his chin and takes a deep breath, placing a hand on the back of her head. His hand wants to tighten in rage, but he fights his muscles from betraying him.

 

 _She’s immune_ , Peter thinks. She’s immune, and she doesn’t even realize that was him.

 

She doesn’t realize what he is.

 

She doesn’t even know _what_ she is.

 

“I was worried sick,” he says, finding his tongue dry but for different reasons. He swallows. “You weren’t anywhere in the house. I didn’t know where you had gone. I ran down the street, calling your name, and some kid said he saw a girl heading toward the forest.” He feels her hand tighten on his neck, feels the dirt roll between their skin. He takes another deep breath. “Let’s get you home,” he finally says, pulling back from her embrace.

 

Peter looks down at her. Lydia is wearing nothing but one of his white button-down dress shirts, the sleeves rolled up, the curves of fabric barely covering her thighs. Her forearms are scratched and bleeding slightly. He sees no other marks on her, and she isn’t severely wounded. Her feet are dark with wet soil, black in the moonlight, and her calves bear the same marks as her forearms. Thorns, most likely.

 

He carries her back to the house, and she clings to him the whole way.

 

When they make it back, he runs a hot bath for her and leaves her to clean up on her own. Lydia is thankful for the time alone. Peter cleans up in his own room and changes into a fresh set of clothes for the night. He thinks the whole time. He needs to figure out what to do next. She is immune, and he can’t turn her.

 

The bitterness at the back of his throat is strong.

 

He spent all of his time grooming her, nurturing her, and she’ll have the memory of the bite but none of the bond.

 

He doesn’t know what to do.

 

His fist balls up. He is on the verge of taking his anger out on the furniture when a soft knock at his door distracts him. Peter turns around to see Lydia standing at the opening of his room, the door ajar, one of her hands holding the knob and the other raised with the knuckles bent. She lowers her hand after he turns to look at her, a shaky smile on her face, and she slips into his room.

 

She doesn’t close the door. They are the only two in the house.

 

Lydia walks up to Peter, but she pauses as she notices his clenched fist.

 

“Are you angry?” she asks, though she doesn’t sound afraid of him anymore. It sounds only as if she is concerned about him—a welcome change, given the past week.

 

He considers his answer carefully.

 

“Afraid,” Peter answers instead. It could be a lie, only it isn’t. He unclenches his fist and goes to the bed, sitting down on the edge of it. He brings his hand to his face, rubbing it over his mouth, cheek, and chin. He stares at a particular spot on the floor of no importance, but it holds his gaze. Lydia doesn’t move to sit beside him. She remains standing, her hands folding in front of her.

 

“Did you think I ran away?”

 

He wants to laugh, and his face twists with the absurdity of it all. He didn’t think she had run away, and yet how does he explain to Lydia how he bit her because he is an Alpha werewolf and he was going to make her his very first beta? She is immune. There is no point in telling her now. He was going to tell her everything once she was like him. She’s not like him, though.

 

She’s never going to be like him.

 

Peter looks right at her. “I don’t know what I was thinking,” he tells her.

 

Lydia accepts his answer with a small nod of her head. She ventures to close the space between them by kneeling in front of him, touches his knee with the palm of her hand, and lays her head in his lap. Peter doesn’t know what to make of the gesture at first, and he remains frozen for a moment before extending his hand to place it on her hair. He runs it down her back, stroking her soothingly through her oversized t-shirt.

 

“This whole week was a blur,” Lydia suddenly whispers. Peter listens in silence as she speaks, his fingers gliding over her back through her long locks. “It’s like I can barely remember anything. I’ve been so sick and nauseous, and everything fades in and out. But I remember you being there,” she adds quietly, rubbing his knee. “I remember you taking care of me.”

 

Peter’s hand stills on her hair, a chill settling along his spine.

 

Lydia is his first, but he doesn’t recall loss of memory being part of the process. It doesn’t seem right. Then again, she is immune. The bite may have affected her in a different way, but he won’t know until he figures out exactly what she is. The confrontation of the reality causes his muscles to tense again.

 

This isn’t how it was supposed to go.

 

“You don’t remember?” he finally asks. The question settles heavy in the air, his fingers still as they await her answer.

 

Lydia shakes her head against his knee before lifting it to place her chin on top of his knee to gaze at him. “No,” she repeats again, her eyes earnest and innocent. The look doesn’t sit well with Peter, though. It nags at the back of his head, and it shows on his face. Innocence has never been much a part of Lydia’s lifestyle. “I don’t remember much,” she adds in a soft voice, looking away. “I’m sorry.”

 

Peter puts his fingers beneath her chin, raising it with a gentle push. The gesture causes her to look at him again. He runs his thumb along her cheek. “Not even the night you became sick?”

 

Lydia’s face falters as if she is trying to remember, and she furrows her brow. She shakes her head, looking right at him.

 

Peter releases a deep breath and lets go of her chin. He looks away, and she rises up from the floor. Lydia places her hands on either side of his face and turns him toward her again. She kisses him, crawling slowly into his lap. Peter was going to think further, but her warm tongue slides along his and cancels out the thoughts. He wraps his arms around her, hands against her back and fingers pressing into her spine, and Lydia pushes into him, laying him against the bed.

 

Her arms are sore, and so are her legs; all are covered in cuts and scratches, and as she kisses him, she winces and jolts from every shift, but Lydia keeps trying to focus on him and kisses him more ardently. Her hands fall to his sleeping pants and tug on the waistband. Peter catches her wrists, stopping her, and pulls away.

 

“Lydia, you’re hurt.”

 

She stares down at him in the darkness. After a moment of stunned silence, there are tears welling in her eyes. They glisten beautifully despite her pain. Her face remains as remarkable as ever, even while her lip trembles. “What’s happening to me?” she asks, a choked whisper.

 

Peter puts his hand behind her head and pulls Lydia down to him, shushing her as he cradles her head in the crook between his chest and chin. He runs his other hand soothingly up and down her back as he feels her hot tears wet his t-shirt.

 

“Everything is going to get back to normal, Lydia, I promise,” he tells her, using his most assuring voice.

 

She cuddles atop him, silent, and stays in his bed that night until she falls asleep beside him.

 

-

 

Lydia is able to return to school the next week. She smiles at him and kisses him on the cheek before she leaves. While she is gone, he spends his time researching all the possibilities of why she might be immune. So far, though, he has too little information to go on, and his searches come up to naught.

  
He wanted Lydia to be his beta. She was supposed to be his first. Peter had great plans to make her his mate, and while only some of the anger has set in, most of it is still at bay because while his plan has failed, he still has her. He can make other betas. He can still keep her.

 

The very idea of turning away from Lydia or leaving her simply because the bite didn’t take almost fills him with a feeling akin to dread. Peter pushes it away, ignoring it.

 

She is still valuable to him.

 

That is the term he chooses to think in.

 

Peter sighs at himself, closing his laptop. He looks out the window and makes a mental list of the names of people he used to know that might be able to answer some of his questions.

 

 _Granted_ , he thinks, _any of them are still alive_.

 

-

 

It takes about three weeks into life after the first full moon since her bite that he realizes Lydia has been sleeping in her own room these past few weeks.

 

She hasn’t been back to his room since that night he found her in the woods.

 

Lydia goes to school. Peter takes care of the house. She never asks him where the money comes from or what he does for a living, but if she does, he has an answer for the question. He does freelance work at home off of his computer. He doesn’t, of course, but that’s the answer.

 

As the days tick by, it becomes increasingly obvious to Peter that they haven’t had sex or touched beyond a simple kiss on the cheek before school or a hug at night since that fateful night in the woods. He needs more, though.

 

He needs _her_.

 

His hand and his memories are simply not enough.

 

It digs at him. It claws restlessly at the surface of his mind, leaving scratches, and Peter finds himself fantasizing about it as he stares at Lydia sitting on the couch while she leans over her textbook during homework. Her hand moves quick as her pencil scribbles, her expression at rapt attention as her hair falls forward and covers the book.

 

Lydia combs it behind her ear and continues, never noticing his stares.

 

When it is time for bed, she smiles brightly at him and kisses his cheek and turns away from him. She doesn’t flounce down the hallway, but to Peter, she might as well be walking away from him sashaying her hips.

 

Peter watches her go with longing on his tongue.

 

-

 

It takes a few days before he makes the journey across the house to her room one night.

 

He slips into the room quietly, closing the door behind himself with a twist of the handle to prevent any noise. He doesn’t want to wake her up, not yet. He doesn’t think too much of Lydia’s distance lately, and he doesn’t read into it. Preferring a subtler approach to outright confrontation, he knows her body hasn’t forgotten the way he can make her feel.

 

Peter wants to start there.

 

He approaches her bed, staring down at her in the darkness. For a moment, Peter just soaks in the sight of Lydia sleeping, lying on her stomach, her head turned to the side and her strawberry-blonde hair in her face as she breathes slowly, and at her most vulnerable.

 

She’s so beautiful like this.

 

His hand reaches out, and he lifts up the covers as she stirs at the wash of cool air against her skin. With Lydia lying flat on her stomach, he crawls into bed over her back, settling himself above her hips without lowering his weight onto her. She stirs, but she doesn’t wake. Not just yet.

 

Peter starts by kissing her back through her t-shirt, and then he runs his hand up her side. His hand rucks up her shirt, touching hot bare skin. He slides it further up her body, spreading out his fingers to feel her, and leans forward to place his lips against her neck.

 

A soft moan, muffled by the pillow, escapes her as she wakes up. Lydia responds to him, her back arching, her bottom pressing into his crotch. Peter props himself up on one hand, and he uses the other to grip her hip and hold her as he rolls his hips into her ass. It elicits a whimper from Lydia’s mouth as she feels his erection rubbing against her. He has no patience for waiting. It’s been too long.

 

Peter slips his hand beneath the waistband of her panties, slides it over the curve of her ass, and then runs it over her hip and lowers his hand between her legs to touch her. Lydia moans, bucking her hips as he begins to rub gentle circles into her clit. He dips a finger into the warmth of her cunt to spread her slickness further, and her heady gasps spur him on. When he positions his hand to slip two fingers inside of her, Lydia gasps at the intrusion, arching her back further, pushing onto his hand until he’s deeper, and Peter groans beside her ear. She’s so eager. He knew she would be. He nips at her ear lobe and begins a steady rhythm, pumping his fingers in and out.

 

Lydia gasps, a different kind of gasp this time. “Wait—” she suddenly says, as if she’s just remembered something, but the moment doesn’t last long. She whines and rolls her hips back at his hand as he hits a spot inside of her that she loves. Lydia bucks against him with more force after that, spreading her legs wider to give him better access. Peter doesn’t bother keeping the pace slow given her response, and Lydia buries her face into the pillow as she cries out with each thrust of his hand.

 

“Hm?” he says softly against her ear. Despite her face buried into the pillow, he doesn’t ignore her comment. “What is it?” Peter inserts a third finger inside Lydia, lowering his mouth to her shoulder to kiss her there. She lets out an ungodly rough noise from her throat as he fills her with all three and gently twists and spreads them while pumping them in and out of her.

 

Lydia turns her head. Her cheeks are red. She opens her legs even wider for him. “We shouldn’t—” she says between moans, “you’re my— _ah_ —” Lydia quakes all over as he touches a sensitive nerve. “We shouldn’t—”

 

She turns her face into the pillow again and buries her cries with it, forgetting all about her argument.

 

“I said I was going to take care of you, Lydia,” Peter tells her, withdrawing his hand and kissing her ear. He runs his hand over her shoulder. “And that’s what I’m going to do.”

 

Peter pulls his hand away from her to sit up and take his shirt off, tossing it aside. He pulls down her sleeping pants and her panties next, helping her to discard of them, and pushes her shirt over her head. Lydia wriggles out of it the rest of the way. Once he’s gotten rid of his boxers, he then takes her hands and places them on the bars of the headboard in front of her, showing her gently how to brace them, before kissing a path from her ear to the area between her shoulder blades.

 

He guides himself to her cunt and pushes into her until he bottoms out against her ass. Lydia’s muscles immediately tense up, and she grips the bars tight. From this angle, it’s too deep for her—and he ought to be gentle with her, but he’s not. Peter places his hand just above the small of Lydia’s back and pushes down with enough pressure that forces her to arch her back and raise her ass higher. Peter grasps her hip in his other hand and begins fucking her with deep thrusts on top of a rough, quick rhythm.

 

The sound of flesh slapping fills the room as he sinks in all the way each time he thrusts, and Lydia cries out her pleasure in whines and screams that sound too much like pain as her back arches rigidly against the constant assault. He knows the difference between her sounds by now, and he can feel her body pulsing with each cry from her throat as he fucks her. Eventually, she tries to pull away from him using the headboard to lighten the sensation of the depth that is making her shudder from the inside out, but Peter wraps his arm around her waist and pulls her back to him and thrusts harder.

 

Lydia screams at the ceiling, her head tilted back as far as it will go; not because it hurts, but she hits an orgasm too quickly, spasms filling her body as she grips the bars until it looks like she might break them if only she had the strength for it. Peter keeps going until she’s had one too many in a row and she’s loose and weary beneath him, and he hasn’t even had his yet.

 

She is boneless by the time he finds his release. When he pulls out of her abruptly, Lydia slumps to the bed, breathless and trembling. Peter falls beside her, breathing hard. He looks over at her. Lydia is still, though her nerves are wrecked to pieces. He can see her visibly quaking.

 

“I can’t move,” she whispers, and he rolls over to her, kissing her shoulder as he runs his fingers up and down her back until her eyelids flutter to a close.

 

She falls asleep still quivering.

 

-

 

It’s a small victory, he thinks, that Lydia can’t walk straight the next day.

 

Peter thinks she won’t forget again. He left a reminder on her, and she turns red and looks away when she catches his gaze on her in the kitchen.

 

He makes breakfast for her still, but she starts leaving early and says she’ll eat at school.

 

Peter frowns.

 

He wonders when she started liking cafeteria food.

 

-

 

Peter starts to notice that whenever he tries to touch Lydia, she pulls away from him.

 

It’s subtle. She only moves an inch or two, but she pulls away.

 

He tries to kiss her one evening on the couch while a movie is playing. She turns away from that, too, and then Lydia says she’s going to fix a snack. She fixes the snack and returns and pointedly takes her time with it.

 

By the time the movie is over, she is only just finishing up.

 

Lydia smiles beautifully at Peter when he looks over at her, and then she gets up with an extra bounce in her step to clean her plate at the kitchen sink.

 

“Would you like to—”

 

He was going to suggest a game or something, but Lydia calls out over him. “I’m getting a shower!”

 

She leaves Peter alone in the living room, staring off in shock.

 

-

 

Lydia still doesn’t come to his room at night.

 

Peter doesn’t know what to think of it, so he finds his way across the house again to her door. She is awake this time when he opens it, and Lydia sits up in bed. She pulls the blanket around herself, giving Peter a pause in the doorway.

 

It’s not a reaction he was expecting, and it catches him off guard.

 

He leaves the door open and moves slowly toward the bed, careful, calculated steps, before sitting down on the edge of it. “How are you feeling?” Peter finally asks, trying to be conversational.

 

“I’m tired,” Lydia responds. “I have school in the morning.”

 

“I know,” he says.

 

Lydia seems to smile at that. “Well, goodnight,” she tells him, and she drops the blanket to her lap so she can scoot beneath it. Peter stops her, cupping her cheek with his hand and leaning in to kiss her. Lydia freezes, but she is soft, not stiff, beneath the touch of his lips. When he tries to deepen the kiss, Lydia turns her head away. His lips catch on her cheek instead of her mouth.

 

Peter freezes, then, too. His hand is still on her cheek.

 

“I’m tired,” she whispers. “I need to sleep.”

 

He knows she isn’t tired. He knows she wasn’t just asleep. With this knowledge, Peter nuzzles the side of her face and whispers, “You don’t have to do anything.” He kisses her cheek, and then the corner of her mouth. “I can gi—” As he reaches her mouth, Lydia turns away from him again.

 

“Please,” she says, more strained this time, “I don’t want to.”

 

Despite his surprise, Peter doesn’t freeze this time. He pulls back from Lydia and stares at her. At first, she doesn’t look at him. When she does, he sees her eyes.

 

He sees something in them.

 

His hand falls from her face. Shortly, he also gets up from the bed and leaves her room.

 

He doesn’t say anything when he leaves.

 

-

 

In his frustration at this recent turn of events, Peter spends his time pouring over old manuscripts he received from an old acquaintance. The pages are thick, worn, brown, and wrinkled, so he fears with each turn of breaking them. Miraculously, they stay in one piece.

 

He finds a section that interests him. He looks at the translation guide beside the tome for reference. Everything in it sounds familiar and echoes of that week with Lydia after the bite.

 

Peter runs his finger along the gilded word at the top of the page.

 

 _Banshee_ , he mouths in silence.

 

The word settles heavy into the bottom of his stomach like a bolt of lead.

 

-

 

While she is away at school, he begins searching her room for clues. Peter looks throughout her room for notepads and journals, anything where she might have scribbled notes, to see if it resembles nonsense or code. He finds nothing in the room, assuming Lydia must have taken all of them to school with her, and tries to think of a way to get a hold of her school notes without drawing her suspicion.

 

As Peter searches through all of Lydia’s personal things, he doesn’t find anything to solidify whether she is a banshee or not, but he does come across something else entirely.

 

A box of condoms, which falls out of the corner of her closet while he plunders through it.

 

It lands on the floor right in front of his feet, and Peter glances down, freezing as he stares at it. Normally, a sight like this wouldn’t bother Peter, but they’ve never used condoms before.

 

He stoops over and picks it up slowly, opening the box and counting how many are inside.

 

The box calls for twenty-four. There are only sixteen inside of it.

 

Peter crushes the final one he counted into the palm of his fist.

 

 


	5. These Volatile Times

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _I’ve got nothing on you._  
> 

_* * *_

 

“Have you made any new friends lately?”

 

Lydia looks up from her soup, her spoon pausing as she dangles it in the air. She seems surprised by his question. Her eyes are wider. It takes her a few moments to catch herself, to resume normalcy once again, and that’s the first hint to Peter of the staged persona she has been giving him lately.

 

He wonders how long it’s been going on, this persona.

 

Her new friend.

 

“I make new friends all the time,” Lydia answers, shrugging her shoulders as she purses her lips like it’s nothing to make a big fuss over. She averts her eyes from his gaze, focusing instead on the soup in front of her as she dips in her spoon for another mouthful.

 

Peter watches her eat, brimming quietly with well-controlled anger.

 

He smiles brightly, though the smile never quite reaches his eyes. “Well,” he tells her, and he makes a grand gesture with his hands, “tell me all about them.” Peter places both elbows on the table as he resumes eating his soup as well. He slumps forward with a relaxed posture to show that he welcomes further conversation on the matter at hand. “You don’t talk much about school lately,” he adds. “I feel like I’m missing out.”

 

Lydia pauses, looking thoughtful as she toys with her spoon in the bowl. It takes only a few seconds before she is recounting her latest adventures at the shopping mall, buying cute outfits and matching shoes, and then planning in advance for her sixteenth birthday party. She wants a grandiose one this year. She missed out on one like that for her fifteenth birthday, she says. What she doesn’t say is it was because she was depressed from her parents’ deaths, leaning solely on him and avoiding other people in her life.

 

But things are changing now, and Peter doesn’t like it.

 

As Lydia becomes more sociable, she spends less time at home. Less time around him. She has excuses to leave the house more often and even more excuses when she comes home late into the night. She doesn’t talk to him as much as she used to, and she doesn’t sneak into his room anymore to crawl into his bed when she can’t seem to fall asleep in her own. Lydia doesn’t slip her arm around his waist and snuggle up to him because the bed is devoid of her presence, the sheets cold on the side where she usually lies.

 

She doesn’t mention any boys during their entire conversation, and Peter makes a mental note of it.

 

If he intends to find out who it is, Peter thinks calmly while scooping up another spoonful of soup and eating it, he is going to have to get more creative.

 

-

 

“I’m going to go out of town for a few days,” Peter announces, lifting the suitcase he just snapped shut on the kitchen counter.

 

He glances over at Lydia. She pauses mid-step over the threshold beside the wall between the kitchen and the living room, her lips pursed in an ‘o’ as she seems to be caught off-guard by the announcement. After a blink, Lydia continues into the kitchen. She walks around the island counter, reaches the refrigerator, and opens it to grab a drink.

 

“What for?” Lydia asks, and then she turns around to face him again. She closes the door with her foot and leans against it, staring at him as she takes a sip from her glass.

 

“It’s for work,” Peter lies. “I have to meet up with an associate.”

 

Lydia takes another sip. “How many days are you gonna be gone?”

 

“Two or three at the most,” he says, “but I should be back before three.”

 

Peter crosses the distance to Lydia, but instead of making a move with a sexual nuance, he simply kisses her on the forehead quick and curt. When he pulls back, Lydia’s confusion is unmistakable on her face and poorly masked behind a wall of stillness. Her expression gives most of it away.

 

“Stay safe,” Peter tells her, patting her arm. It elicits another confused look from Lydia, one that he may have called longing if he didn’t know any better. Still, she doesn’t move. She is so used to him acting one way with her. For him to change it now, she must feel she is losing her control over the situation.

 

It’s no longer her decision but his as well.

 

He lowers his chin and gives her a look with raised eyebrows. “And no parties,” he adds pointedly before turning away to leave.

 

Lydia doesn’t say anything as he leaves, though.

 

Not even goodbye.

 

-

 

On the night of the very first day that he’s supposed to be gone, Peter lounges on the couch in the dark. There is a movie playing on the television, the sound down low. It’s a particularly dark movie with very little light, so it won’t show up from the windows. He makes this choice on purpose, so that Lydia still thinks he isn’t home.

 

They stumble in through the front door, laughter filling up the den.

 

Peter looks up. He reaches over and turns on a light—a lamp to his left—and the laughter is instantly hushed with silence from the boy and a gasp from Lydia.

 

“Oh, you’re home,” Peter says, pretending to not mind the intrusion. He gets up from the couch and makes his way around the side of it to get a better look up close at the boy that Lydia has brought home. Both of them are frozen on the threshold of the living room, and they aren’t touching anymore. They were touching when they first stumbled into the house, but Lydia had taken her arm away from him at the sound of Peter’s voice and put some space between their bodies.

 

He has the upper hand now, though, and what’s done is done. Peter can’t erase the past, but he can influence the future. He can still fix this.

 

If he can find out what broke it.

 

Lydia opens her mouth to say something, but no words come out. She is frozen in fear, but not the kind of fear where she looks afraid for her life or her safety. She is, however, afraid of what Peter is going to say.

 

Or do.

 

She glances over at the young man, her fists curling awkwardly at her sides. The boy himself glances apprehensively between Lydia and Peter. He makes the first move. Taking a step forward, he reaches out his hand to Peter. The boy swallows nervously, but he keeps his voice steady.

 

“Jackson, sir,” he introduces himself. “Jackson Whittemore.”

 

Peter is impressed. It’s a quick recovery. He reaches out to clasp Jackson’s hand.

 

“Peter,” he introduces himself right back. He shakes the boy’s hand with a firm grip. There is a lot to be said of a person through their handshake, and Peter likes to make his known. Jackson’s grip, however, is also firm and strong. His animal nature senses the threat almost instantaneously—if Jackson were a werewolf, he would have the natural temperament fit for an Alpha—and Peter’s hand tightens momentarily, causing Jackson to look down in confusion at their clasped hands.

 

Peter lets him go quickly, recovering himself from the slip. “It’s late,” he says, to draw Jackson’s attention back to the present issue at hand.

 

Jackson immediately forgets the awkward handshake, barreling forward with an explanation to save Lydia from a possible punishment. “It was my fault, sir,” he tells Peter, placing a hand on his chest and looking over at Lydia. “I lost track of time, and we were just on a da—”

 

“Jackson,” Lydia breaks in, cutting him off with a firm tone. “Maybe you should get back home before you’re any more late yourself?” Lydia gives Jackson a look, raising her eyebrows as she pleads with him silently.

 

He glances between her and Peter and seems to get the message. “Yeah, sure,” he says, but he steps once more toward Peter and nods his head in a perfect display of good manners that his parents must have taught him from a young age. Peter senses a tempest beneath the calm surface, though. There is rebellion brewing in this boy like a storm. He wonders what sort of act Jackson is putting on, for who and why.

 

“It’s nice to finally meet you, Mr. Wagner,” Jackson tells him, looking him right in the face. He is very direct, continuing the conversation instead of listening to Lydia and leaving. Again, Peter senses a challenge in it, but whether it is a real or imaginary challenge, he isn’t yet able to tell. It does, however, set his teeth on edge. “Lydia has told me all about you.”

 

Peter smiles, looking from Jackson to Lydia. “Has she, now?”

 

Lydia’s unease is alight on the air like a burning match to his nose, her heartbeat rapid in her chest. He could play with her. He really could if he wanted to, but he decides enough is enough and he turns his focus back onto Jackson.

 

“Make sure to get her home earlier next time,” Peter tells Jackson. “Her curfew is midnight, and it’s—” He glances at the nearest clock, lifting his eyebrows. “Past one in the morning.”

 

Jackson nods quickly, gulping past a lump in his throat thanks to his nerves, and accepts the easy ticket out. “Yes, sir,” he repeats, and then he leaves. He calls out a single goodnight to them both at the doorway. When it shuts behind him, Peter turns away from Lydia and returns back to the couch. Instead of watching the movie again, he picks up the nearest newspaper and begins to read with the new light from the lamp.

 

Lydia is still standing where he last left her.

 

He can hear her fingers clenching and unclenching, the sound of her knuckles a series of soft cracks attuned only to his senses.

 

“You said you were going to be gone,” she finally says, and Peter wonders if it’s a confession or an accusation. Her voice is so steady, so he has trouble discerning the difference.

 

He folds the paper over to the next page. “I finished early,” he simply replies.

 

The tension is thick in the air. It gives Peter a momentary pause where he lifts up his head just a fraction and stills to listen to her heartbeat, an erratic pump within her ribcage. Before he knows it, Lydia has circled around the couch to face him. She stands only a few feet away from Peter, glaring at him with as much ferocity as she can muster.

 

“That’s it?” Lydia shoots at him. “You finished early? ‘Her curfew is midnight’? Is that _all_ you have to say?”

 

Peter maintains eye contact with her as he closes the newspaper. “What else do you want me to say, Lydia?” he asks calmly.

 

He notes the way her lip trembles. The barely noticeable watering of her eyes. An unnerved quality to the way Lydia’s fingers curl at her sides as she stands there, staring at him in shock. Peter realizes, with far too much relish, she is wounded by his lack of reaction. He can see the breath leaving her lungs, exhaled shakily through her mouth.

 

Lydia never intended to flaunt Jackson in front of him, but he realizes now that is because she was afraid of his reaction. Anger. Jealousy. Perhaps even violence or rage. She expected him to lash out, and here he is, as calm as can be.

 

And she can’t stand it.

 

She wants him to react. She _wants_ him to care. Peter sees the hooks he has in her, however invisible they may have appeared before, and he feels himself relaxing with the knowledge. Whatever drove Lydia away from him, she is still affected by her feelings for him. Affection. Dependence. Yes, even longing. Peter sees it in her face as she stands there, staring at him in silence. He can’t help but wonder if her new inexperienced lover can even manage to make her feel half of the things he can incite in her.

 

He bets the answer is no.

 

“It’s your life, Lydia,” Peter tells her in a soft voice, placing the newspaper in his lap onto the couch beside him. A little bit of reverse psychology wouldn’t hurt. “I just want you to be happy, and if Jackson makes you happy, then . . . ” Peter does his best to smile for Lydia, but even smiling for her benefit seems harder than he thought it would be.

 

Of course it bothers him. Of course it stings, but if this is his only opportunity to win her back, then he has to play his cards just right.

 

Lydia only stares at him for a few more seconds before she storms away. On the surface she seems angry but fine, but the reality makes itself clear when she gets to her room and closes the door.

 

She cries and cries until her throat hurts, and then she cries some more.

 

He itches to twist the doorknob to her bedroom, to go to her, to comfort her, but he knows she’ll only rail against him harder. She needs to come to him. Peter has to keep pretending he doesn’t care.

 

So he picks up the newspaper, and he reads it while she cries.

 

-

 

If Peter thought things couldn’t get any worse, well, then he was wrong.

 

Lydia is ice cold in the days that follow. She barely talks to him, and she makes sure not to stay in the same room as him for too long.

 

Peter attempts to bring things back to how they were in the beginning, but Lydia dodges his hands, even if they are meant for only a hug, his suggestions, and his concerns about her behavior.

 

She flips her hair over her shoulder and gives him a quelling look that he is sure must spark fear in the souls of boys her own age, but they don’t work on him.

 

He maintains his self-assurance and his calmness despite it all, but everyone has a breaking point.

 

Everyone.

 

-

 

Peter’s breaking point comes when he returns home from a late night run to pick up a few things for the house. Right as he walks through the front door, he hears Lydia’s moans echo down from her room, the soft creak of the bed, and the hairs on the back of his neck stand up as his wolf senses fly into overdrive.

 

His first thought is that she did this on purpose.

 

Lydia _knew_ he would be back tonight. This is no accident.

 

He throws the bag aside, its contents spilling across the floor, and takes the steps two at a time until he reaches the top and slams open her bedroom door without bothering to check the lock.

 

Jackson is on top of Lydia in the bed, and they are right in the middle of fucking.

 

The boy reacts quickly to the intrusion, looking up immediately and flying off of her in his sudden fear. He nearly topples off of the mattress as his ankles twist in the sheets. Lydia tries to cover herself with them, and Jackson goes to snatch up the nearest article of his clothing that he can find—a t-shirt—and uses it to cover his privates.

 

He is backing away towards the wall as Peter advances slowly on him.

 

“Please, Mr. Wagner—”

 

Peter snatches Jackson by the throat and slams him into the wall. Lydia screams from the bed. Jackson drops the t-shirt, raising his hands to his throat to try and fight off Peter’s clenching grip that restricts his breathing, but Peter only tightens his fingers harder around Jackson’s throat.

 

“You’re going to get the fuck out of my house,” Peter says quietly, looking him straight in the eyes, “and if I ever see you around Lydia again, I am going to cut off those balls, shove them down your throat, and you’re going to _choke_ on them as you look up at my smiling face. Do I make myself clear?”

 

When Peter doesn’t get an answer out of Jackson, just wide-eyed horror staring back at him, he pats at Jackson’s cheek with a near slap to jog a reaction. Jackson pinches his eyes shut and turns away from it.

 

“Do I make myself _clear_?” Peter repeats louder, raising his tone to a threatening level.

 

He lets go of Jackson before he gets a reply, shoving the young man and taking a step back. Jackson stumbles away from him in fear and nearly trips on his own two feet, snatching up his clothes along the run toward Lydia’s bedroom door. “You’re a fucking _psychopath_ ,” Jackson hollers unevenly, looking from Peter to Lydia. “You both _deserve_ each other—fucking _psychos_ —”

 

Lydia is sitting on the bed with her hands over her mouth, trying not to cry.

 

Peter hears Jackson running through the house. The front door bangs in his wake as he leaves, and Peter can finally breathe a little more easily, but there is still the matter of Lydia.

 

This doesn’t look good for him.

 

“I _hate_ you,” Lydia yells at him through her tears. “I hate you _so much_.”

 

Peter rolls the lie off his shoulders and looks down at the floor. He casually picks up an article of her clothing, discarded in her frenzy with Jackson, and tosses it to her on the bed. “Put on some clothes,” he says.

 

Lydia picks up her blouse and throws it with more force back at him. The blouse hits his cheek, and he turns away from the impact, closing his eyes.

 

“Do you _hear_ me?” she shouts at him. “ _I hate you!_ ”

 

Peter half-morphs his face in front of her, roaring at her.

 

Lydia screams a second time and scrambles backward into the headboard. Her fight or flight instinct kicks in, and she flies from the bed and escapes the room in nothing but her bare skin. Peter thinks he ought to be worried at such a reaction, but he hasn’t had a chase in so long.

 

He tears through the house after her once he gives her a head start, wondering if he should let her get outside before he catches her or stop her before she reaches any of the doors. If she screams beyond the confines of the house, he will have a hard time explaining it to the neighbors when they call the cops.

 

There is a mix of fear and arousal in the air, and he runs after the scent, breathing it in deep.

 

Peter decides to stop her before she reaches the outside, and he bears her down onto the cold hard tiles of the kitchen floor. Lydia screams in terror again, but she also fights him. She fights him good. She claws him, ripping skin, and he hisses. She kicks at him and struggles and manages to make the entire thing a living hell as he fights for control. When he rolls her over onto her back, naked and flushed beneath him, Lydia claws at his eyes and he growls. He snatches her wrists and pins them to the ground, and Lydia jerks upward to bite his nose.

 

Her teeth sink deep, drawing blood. His vision flashes to white, to black, to red, and he jerks his head back quickly before slamming it down. The impact of her head against the floor causes Lydia to let go of his nose, her eyes fluttering as her head rolls back and forth. He can feel her strength loosening beneath his grip.

 

His blood is singing with the victory of it.

 

As she comes back to herself, he decides to keep the wolfish face that frightened her so. She has already seen it, so she might as well get used to it. This is what he is, and he ought to have told her sooner. She should’ve known long before now, but it’s too late to correct that mistake. It is only a minor transformation, not his full one, but it’s enough to get the point across.

 

Her eyelids flutter, her vision slowly coming back to her, and she rolls her head upward and freezes as his face comes into view. Her brief moment of vertigo has given her a calmness she didn’t have before. That, possibly coupled with the fact that he hasn’t torn her throat out yet, prevents Lydia from screaming or fighting him again. Her fingers flex against her palms, her heart racing in her chest as her eyes dart over his face, drinking in the distorted features.

 

Lydia licks her lips and opens her mouth, her eyes fluttering once more with the motion. “What are you?” she asks softly.

 

There is no tremble in her voice.

 

Peter tilts his head to the side. He feels the blood running down his nose over his mouth. He licks it away slowly before removing one of his hands from her wrist. His claws are extended, and he lifts one to her forehead, delicately pulling away a loose curl from her face.

 

Lydia’s eyes follow the movement of his claw, her chest rising and falling rapidly beneath his own.

 

“What do you think I am?” he asks her, dragging his claw along the smoothness of her cheek. He doesn’t know why he’s toying with her. He probably shouldn’t. But there are many things that he probably shouldn’t do, and he does them anyway.

 

“A monster,” she whispers, her voice wavering at last.

 

It stings, but he doesn’t let it show. Instead, Peter tilts his head to the other side, a sad tone affecting his voice since his face won’t allow for much expression in this form. “I’m hurt, Lydia.”

 

“You _bit_ me,” she says with more ferocity, rising momentarily from the floor.

 

 _Ah, there it is_ , Peter thinks. _The truth_.

 

“So, you do remember,” he says, not surprised with the revelation. Peter had his suspicions from the very beginning of the lie, but he hadn’t known at the time if they were valid, so he dismissed them. The thought, however, always lingered at the back of his mind, temporarily forgotten until now.

 

“Of _course_ I remember,” Lydia hisses back. “I remember _everything_.”

 

“Then,” he counters, “why did you lie?”

 

Peter runs the back of his claw along the underside of her neck, and Lydia cranes her head back. She doesn’t answer him this time, and he thinks it is because the inevitable answer will reveal more than she wants to admit to him, and he’s not half wrong. Lydia shudders beneath the touch of his claw, but the shudder is not based in repulsion. She is naked beneath him, and there is nothing to shield his nose from her arousal.

 

Despite that, he knows now is not the time, and he also knows Lydia won’t let it happen. He won’t force it either.

 

The goal is to conquer her, not demolish her.

 

“All you’ve done,” Lydia says unevenly, “is lie to _me_ —”

 

“Now, that’s not true,” Peter interrupts. “I may have withheld some truths from you, but I’ve never lied to you.”

 

“You never told me you were—”

 

“—A werewolf,” Peter finishes for her, admitting to it at last. “That’s what I am, Lydia.” He leans in closer to her face. “A _werewolf_ ,” he whispers.

 

Lydia stares at him, falling silent at the word, her eyes roving over his face again. They remain in silence as her eyes navigate the strange changes of his face, never quite grasping the reality that is right in front of her. Peter thinks that Lydia must believe she is dreaming until her hand—the one he is no longer pinning down—rises up from the floor to trace along the odd features he now possesses.

 

He jerks back at first, unfamiliar with the gentleness with which she reaches out to him. Peter is used to fucking her, hugging her, and even the pleasant way in which Lydia had once huddled against him could be boiled down to a desire for bodily warmth. All were physical acts to satisfy an urge or a purpose, but this is Lydia’s choice and it is different.

 

Her fingers graze over his face with soft, feathery light touches. Lydia avoids his nose where her teeth broke the skin, the bite marks red and swollen.

 

Her hand falls to his chin before falling away completely, laying on the floor.

 

“That’s why you bit me,” Lydia says quietly, the world finally clicking together to make sense again. She blinks her eyes as she looks up at him. “You wanted me to be like you.”

 

Peter looks away from her long enough to morph his face back into human form. His claws are gone, too, retracted back beneath his nail beds. The game is over, and there is a slight taste of bitterness on the back of his tongue. He lets go of her and rises from the floor, leaving Lydia to scoot upward into a sitting position and use her arms to shield her nudity.

 

It’s nothing he hasn’t seen, but Peter removes his own shirt and walks around to stand behind her, draping the material over her shoulders.

 

Lydia moves to stand, clutching the shirt around herself, and Peter can’t help but wonder what comes next.

 

She turns around to face him. “Why didn’t you just tell me?” she asks.

 

He meets her gaze. “Would you have reacted any differently?”

 

Lydia doesn’t need long to think of her answer. “No,” she says, “but I thought—”

 

 _I thought you were a monster, trying to hurt me_ , Peter hears her finish in his head.

 

The problem is it’s not far from the truth. His preoccupation with her is anything but healthy, but he was never one for following a traditional mindset of rules. He likes to break them, likes to reconstruct his own. By the rules of the wild, she is of perfect age, but humans have a funny way of judging years that he isn’t entirely used to. He was born a werewolf, after all.

 

Peter can’t deny that he wanted to sink his teeth into her side and taste her blood, to tear into her like a rabid animal and prove his dominance over her. He likes to control things; he likes to be _in_ control. He can’t deny that having her broken and bloody beneath him didn’t make his veins sing with joy and that it took all of his willpower to not rip into her and take everything.

 

She thinks, however, that perhaps he had wanted to change her out of loneliness or out of his feelings for her.

 

There are many things that Lydia Martin still doesn’t know about him.

 

Peter intends to keep it that way.

 

“It didn’t take,” Lydia whispers. Her words break past his thoughts like a bucket of ice cold water to the face. “Did it?”

 

“No,” Peter says softly, giving her some measure of honesty.

 

Lydia is silent, nodding her head. She takes a step back without looking at him. “I need some time alone,” she says, “to think. Please.”

 

She walks away from him, and he watches her go. Peter watches her ascend the steps until she disappears from sight and he hears the door to her bedroom click shut quietly behind her. He listens carefully, but he doesn’t hear any crying from her room. All is silent, and it pervades throughout the house.

 

He lowers his head and walks toward the refrigerator, opening it up. Peter grabs all of the ingredients for making a sandwich and decides to stay up until Lydia comes back down. He is sure she won’t fall asleep anytime soon. There is too much on her mind and too many questions in her brain.

 

Peter uses a butter knife to spread out the mayonnaise across a slice of bread and glances up at the floor above his head. He glances back down again, focusing on his task.

 

She’ll come down when she’s ready, and he’ll be waiting for her.

 

 


	6. Bite Down and Say Goodbye

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _Who do you tell where you buried the bones if no one’s going to make you pay?_  
> 

_* * *_

 

He must’ve dozed off while waiting on the couch, because when he comes to, it’s to the cutting sensation of a thin metal chain tightening around his throat.

 

 _Silver_ , Peter thinks immediately, and he goes to grasp the chain to break it.

 

He is stopped before he can manage it by the added pressure of a sharp kitchen knife poised right against his Adam’s apple. Peter stills, but for the burning chafe of the chain irritating his skin. Silver is more effective inside the body rather than held against it, but he isn’t about to tell her that. Still, she came prepared.

 

“Did you _kill_ my parents?” she demands. Her voice wavers in fear of the answer he may yet give to the accusation. She is not ready for an answer to that question, but she asks it anyway. Peter tries to swallow against the chain she has around his throat, but it hurts—the silver burns and the knife scrapes when he swallows. Lydia twists one hand, tightening the chain further. “ _Did_ you?”

 

“Do you— _hear_ yourself—” he manages to choke out. “You sound— _ridiculous_ —”

 

Lydia twists harder.

 

“No!” Peter gasps. “No! I didn’t— _kill_ —your parents—”

 

“How do I know you’re telling the truth?” she insists. If her voice is anything to go by, Lydia is on the verge of tears. “You show up into my life, my parents are mauled to death, you take me in, and _you’re a werewolf_. How do I even know you are who you say you are?”

 

Peter has had enough of these games.

 

He jerks forward, snapping the chain in two. Lydia’s knife slices his throat in the process, but it’s only a shallow cut and the knife falls from her hand as he knocks her arm aside. She backs up from the couch, but he has already turned around—and he leaps over it, landing with a heavy thud on his feet. In her fear she goes to run, but Peter snatches Lydia by the shirt and yanks her back to him, locking an arm around her waist and leaning his mouth against her ear.

 

She struggles against him, but his grip is like iron around her waist.

 

“Do you _really_ think,” Peter says, “that I’m the only werewolf in this godforsaken town?” He breathes heavily against her ear. She has given him a time tonight; he can barely keep up with her. “ _No_ , that’s too simple. Too easy. That can’t possibly make sense. I didn’t kill your parents, but I know who _did_.”

 

“Then, why haven’t you done _anything_ about it—”

 

Peter shoves her away from him. For once, his emotions get the better of him. He is not entirely immune to their persuasion, and this one hurts. This one hurts.

 

“Because we were supposed to hunt them _together_!” he yells.

 

Lydia is stunned, standing in silence a few feet away. She had stumbled, but she caught herself, and now she stands unsure in front of Peter, regarding him with uncertainty in her gaze. Lydia doesn’t know whether to believe him or even trust him, but he can see his words have given her pause, so he takes the opportunity while it’s open.

 

“The bite,” Peter says slowly, “was supposed to change you. We were supposed to hunt them together.” That was the plan. That is the truth of it. There are some things he has lied to her about, others he has still hidden, but this one isn’t false. For once, he isn’t lying. “I wanted you to have that closure. This is my town, my _family’s_ town. What good is an Alpha who can’t protect his own?”

 

It sounds noble, worthy of praise, forgoing his obsession with Lydia that led him down the path of standing outside her window almost every night to watch her and then murdering her uncle to gain custody of her, to take Lydia in under his wing. Peter is still selfish, after all, a mark that will never leave him. He is selfish and prideful and vengeful and obsessive, and he can never let go. He has never learned how to.

 

Lydia catches the slip, though. She squints her eyes slightly, backing a step away from him as she wraps her arms loosely around her middle.

 

“You say ‘my,’” she tells him softly. “Don’t you mean ‘our’?”

 

Peter lifts his chin, taking a step forward to counter her step back.

 

“No,” he says, “I don’t.” She continues to back away from him, and he continues walking forward. “The bite didn’t change you.” Lydia backs herself into the wall, and Peter stops just in front of her. He tilts his head to the side, affecting a sad look in his face as he looks down at her. “You’re not like me,” he says softly, and he reaches out to curl a lock of her hair around his finger. He twirls it before he lets it go. “We are from different bloodlines. You’re immune.”

 

It’s the truth, though it walks a fine line.

 

Lydia breathes in deeply, her chest shuddering with the motion. “Who did it?”

 

Peter narrows his eyes as he shakes his head. “Now, if I tell you that, you’ll go off running to do something about it and get yourself killed, Lydia, and then what?”

 

“I won’t,” she lies.

 

“Yes, you will,” he tells her. “They were your parents. Of course you will.”

 

“I need to know,” she says, and her voice trembles.

 

Peter raises a hand to her face, caressing her cheek with it. Lydia closes her eyes. She doesn’t turn away from it. Instead, she leans into his hand. “I’ll tell you,” he says, “when we’re ready. When we can do something about it.”

 

“What do we need?” she asks softly. “To be ready?”

 

“A pack,” Peter whispers, leaning close to her mouth. He is weak without a pack, even as an Alpha. He can’t take them on alone. Even with a pack, they will all be betas, but it’s better than nothing. He can train them, and they can follow a plan. Separate the enemy. Target them one by one. They are stronger together, weaker apart. Neutralize them from the inside out.

 

Idly, Peter wonders if he should tell her about the information he dug up in those dusty old tomes he borrowed to discover what might be ailing her. It’s not even been three months since the bite. Lydia has shown only vague signs of the symptoms that he’s seen, but he needs to know.

 

He needs to find a way to test her.

 

 _Death_ , Peter thinks.

 

His thumb grazes over her lips, and Lydia parts them under his touch. The air is charged with an electric current, so he kisses her because they can never seem to escape this. Peter bites down gently on her bottom lip, and Lydia wraps her arms around his neck. He hauls her up against the wall. Her legs go around his waist, locking at the ankles behind his back. She may have had sex with Jackson earlier, but Peter doesn’t care. She will always be his, even if she strays.

 

He runs his hands over her bottom to find underwear she wasn’t wearing before and pulls them down before realizing that’s useless, so he shreds them with one of his claws. Lydia gasps against his mouth and arches against the wall. It’s only fair, he thinks, that he finish what he so inconveniently interrupted earlier, so he deepens the kiss as he frees himself from his pants and strokes himself until he’s hard, teasing her as he rubs the tip against the slight slickness between her legs.

 

However, he also thinks she deserves a little punishment.

 

Peter pushes into her before she’s ready, and Lydia cries out into his mouth, their kiss drowning out the sound. He stands there still, sheathed inside of her, giving her time to adjust. Lydia pounds her fist into his shoulder, mad with him, and he moves his lips against hers until her hand loosens and she grasps his shoulder as she returns the kiss. Her fingers slide into his hair as her arms slip a little higher, and he manages to get both of his arms hooked beneath her legs, separating them from their fastened grip around his waist.

 

Peter pulls out slowly, gently pushing back in until she’s full of him and gasping against his lips. One of her hands finds its way to his cheek, the other still lodged in his hair. “Yes, please,” Lydia begs, and he complies.

 

His throat has healed from the slice of her blade, skin dappled in his own blood, but it still burns in red splotches from the silver she nearly strangled him with—a long-chained silver necklace from her room because not only is Lydia intelligent, she’s quick-thinking and creative—and he’s already got his cock buried inside of her again and her back against the wall.

 

He slumps against her when he’s finished, pulling out, but he keeps her in place against the wall with his arms hooked underneath her knees. Lydia is still at first, breathing heavily, until she squirms in his grasp. Peter then lowers his face to her chest, nuzzling the bare skin above the open buttons on her shirt.

 

“Be still,” he says against her skin, and Lydia falls still, breathing harder.

 

She only complies with his orders when he says them softly.

 

Peter waits until he knows her discomfort has become a small aching pain before he lowers her to the ground. Lydia tries to steady herself on her feet, but then she loses her balance and topples into him, her hand on his chest stopping her from a complete fall. His hands catch her arms, and they stare at each other in the dark.

 

Out of the blue, Lydia slaps him.

 

Peter is shocked, but only marginally so, and turns his head back to face her. She slaps him again, and he snatches her wrist. Lydia hits him with her other hand, a forceful blow to his chest for someone so small, and Peter goes to grab that hand, too, but Lydia twists in his grasp and stomps his foot. He grunts in pain, shoving her against the wall with her arm behind her back and cheek against the plaster.

 

Peter isn’t sure what’s going on until Lydia releases a moan from her parted lips and arches her ass into him. The rush of blood from the struggle goes somewhere else, but he needs a minute. He needs a minute to be ready again. Peter kicks her legs apart forcefully, eliciting another moan from Lydia, but then he thinks this is a fine line, even for him.

 

He leans his cheek against the side of her face, his lips brushing along the shell of Lydia’s ear. “Are we on the same page?” Peter asks her.

 

“Touch me,” Lydia breathes out, “fuck me—just _do_ something.”

 

He touches her because he hasn’t done that yet, and Peter realizes how much she has been missing him. It’s the only thing to account for her behavior tonight, and it explains the deep shudder that passes through her when he simply traces the tips of his fingers lightly up her back along the curve. He teases her, holding her wrist firmly in his grasp and using his other hand to graze the sensitive spots of her body, just barely touching them at all.

 

Lydia actually growls at him in frustration, trying to push away from the wall to free herself. Peter pushes her back into it, and he gives Lydia what she wants. He takes care of her with his hand until she is shuddering against him on the verge of something higher. He brings her close but not quite there, and then he takes it away. Lydia pounds her fist into the wall, a distraught groan deep in her throat. “I _hate_ y—”

 

Peter cuts off the affront and replaces it with a sudden gasp from her lips as he pushes into her from behind—and that’s what it is, an affront, because she wants it to hurt, but it doesn’t hurt because he knows better—and he fucks her rougher than before. He ruts into her like a wild animal until Lydia screams, pressing her flattened palms against the wall as she arches further into him to give him better access. In his frenzy Peter winds an arm up and around her body and clamps his fingers down on her throat. He tightens them, continuing with the same ruthless pace, and Lydia hits her palm flat against the wall, her mouth open but no sound coming out. She drags her nails against the paint, scraping it from the wall.

 

Lydia rides out a series of muffled orgasms in between his fingers loosening and tightening around her throat before Peter slams into her one final time and spills himself inside of her with a loud grunt ripped from his throat. Peter lets go of his hold on her immediately, and Lydia gasps for air like she can’t breathe. His head swims with light-headedness, and he nearly loses his balance until Lydia actually loses hers. Quickly, he reacts, catching her in his arms. Peter leans both of them against the wall, breathing heavily into the crook of her neck.

 

For a long time, neither of them can speak. Peter isn’t sure how long they stand there with unbalanced legs, the world tilting precariously around them.

 

Lydia is the first one to break the silence.

 

“I’ll pick them,” Lydia finally says when she can speak again.

 

“ . . . What?” Peter asks, confused. He doesn’t know what she is talking about. He can’t remember the last conversation they were having. It has fled from his mind completely.

 

“The pack,” she breathes out. “I pick them.”

 

Peter runs his fingers along her arm, staring at the wall ahead of him. He closes his eyes, breathing in her scent. It always seems to calm him or excite him. In this instance Peter has had all the excitement he can take for one night, so her smell calms him down, slows his heart rate to a steady beat.

 

He opens his eyes again slowly.

 

“Okay,” he agrees.

 

-

 

The first person she suggests is her new friend at school, Allison. Peter begins by asking a series of questions about her new friend. Allison has both of her parents. No siblings. Stable household. High income. Forward personality. She seems like a borderline candidate, bordering more on ‘no’ than ‘yes,’ but Peter wants Lydia to be happy, so he amuses her. She has been spending a lot of time with Allison lately, and Lydia really likes her.

 

He doesn’t think there is enough to warrant her friend being happily committed to such a drastic change in her life, though.

 

“What’s her name again?” Peter asks, stirring sugar into his coffee.

 

“Allison,” Lydia says in a chipper tone. “Allison Argent.”

 

Peter freezes.

 

“No,” he instantly says. His tone is firm. There is no room for argument.

 

Lydia’s face falls. “Why not? She’s perfect. She’s—”

 

“—The daughter of a well-known _werewolf_ hunter family,” Peter explains to her. “So, unless you want my head mounted on a trophy wall, the answer is no.”

 

Lydia isn’t happy with his answer, so she pouts.

 

She doesn’t, however, push the subject any further.

 

-

 

“What about Scott?” Lydia asks one day while Peter is driving her to school.

 

Peter furrows his brow. “Who?”

 

“ _Scott_ ,” Lydia drawls out on purpose, enunciating his name. “He’s a freshmen—or sophomore—anyway, he has this crush on Allison, but she doesn’t notice. It’s totally obvious, though. He follows her around like a puppy. He came over to get my math notes, remember? I tutor him sometimes.”

 

“Uh huh,” Peter says, still not recalling the boy.

 

“Anyway, I think he’d be good.”

 

“What’s his name again?”

 

“Scott . . . ” Lydia trails off. She doesn’t remember his full name. “Scott McCall!” she finally says, remembering at last. Peter glances over at her briefly. She smiles, looking pleased with herself for remembering. Peter is willing to bet Lydia does not spend much time trying to remember the names of people who aren’t on the same social ladder as her.

 

“Tell me more about him,” Peter says slowly. His interest is piqued.

 

Lydia takes a deep breath before diving in. What she knows isn’t much, but it’s enough for Peter to form an opinion and go from there.

 

-

 

“You should invite him over,” Peter tells her one evening during dinner.

 

Lydia looks up from her plate, pausing. “ . . . Scott?”

 

“No, the tall and gangly one. Yes, Scott.”

 

Lydia twirls her fork in the air, smiling. “Okay,” she tells him. “Oh, and I found another.”

 

“Who?” Peter asks.

 

“Her name is Erica,” Lydia tells him. “She’s quiet and shy, but she has seizures. I’m sure she would like to get rid of those. She doesn’t seem very happy.” Lydia twists some spaghetti around her fork. She looks sad. “I think it would make her happy, and since I can’t have Allison . . . ”

 

She talks about it as if she will be the one turning them. Peter frowns.

 

“This isn’t a game, Lydia.”

 

Lydia stops twisting her fork. She blinks, looking up from her plate. “I know.”

 

“We aren’t turning people to make them into pets—”

 

“No, we’re turning them because we like them and we care about them and want to keep them with us, right?” Lydia is staring right at him across the table. “That is why you tried to turn me, _right_?”

 

Peter’s jaw tightens. “Yes,” he answers her.

 

Lydia looks down at her plate again, her fierceness leaving her. “Well, that’s how I feel about Allison,” she says, and she pokes at her spaghetti again.

 

“Her parents are—”

 

Lydia shoves back her chair and stands up from the table. “Yes, I know, _werewolf_ hunters,” she spits back, and she storms out of the kitchen without another word.

 

Peter sighs, dropping his fork onto his plate.

 

-

 

They fuck that night, quick and hard, because Lydia is angry and Peter is trying to appease her. She leaves claw marks down his back with angry red fissures that heal with every scrape, but the skin and blood sticks beneath her nails. He grunts half in pleasure, half in pain, but he doesn’t tell her to stop. He likes it as much as she does.

 

Contrary to their bed habits, their sleeping habits are the opposite. She curls into a little ball against his chest, her knees up. It prevents their bodies from getting too close. Still, Lydia rests the top of her head against his chest. Instead of putting an arm around her, which is too hard in this position anyway, Peter keeps his arm between them and Lydia wraps hers around his with a curl, threading their fingers together as she holds his hand.

 

Peter doesn’t think much of it. He burrows his nose against her hair. This is their den and she is his mate, and her heartbeat is the blood he has tasted and he will never get the taste of it out of his mouth.

 

He plays with her hair until he falls asleep against it.

 

-

 

“Wow,” Scott says, grinning wide-mouthed like a fool in love, “this is amazing, Mr. Wagner, thank you. Wow . . . ”

 

The boy stares at the food like he’s never seen anything more fantastic in his life.

 

Peter raises his eyebrows. “Do you like it?” he asks, glancing over at Lydia with amusement on his face. He’s never seen someone get so excited over food before.

 

“ _Yes_ ,” Scott says. “I mean, yes. Well, you see, my mom, she doesn’t cook like this. She works really long shifts at the hospital, so we normally just order take out or heat up pre-cooked meals, you know? I just never . . . ” Scott sighs, gazing at the dressed up turkey that’s covered with glaze and berries and garnish. “Wow,” he adds.

 

Peter gestures at the food on the table. “Well, go on, dig in,” he tells Scott.

 

Scott reaches out for some tongs. “Yes, Mr. Wagner—”

 

“Please,” he interrupts, smiling. “Peter. You can call me Peter, Scott.”

 

“Yes, Mr. Peter—”

 

Lydia snorts, and then she giggles behind her hand, which is dangling her fork in front of her face. Scott came over for tutoring tonight, and he was invited to stay for dinner afterwards, and he agreed happily.

 

Scott has a non-threatening personality, so Peter wasn’t bothered in the slightest at leaving him alone with Lydia in her room. The boy is the perfect candidate. He doesn’t have a father, a role that Peter can easily fill for him, and he has dreams of being something more than what he is. Scott wants to make the lacrosse team, but he has asthma holding him back. He is also slow and clumsy.

 

He’s a sweet kid, though, and sweet kids can be more easily persuaded.

 

Corrupted, even.

 

Scott McCall is no exception.

 

-

 

They invite him over enough times that he’s starting to feel like family, and then out of the blue, an awkward question comes up between Scott and Lydia out in the living room while Peter is cleaning up in the kitchen, and Peter hears it.

 

“Wait,” Scott suddenly says, pausing. “We’re not, like . . . dating, are we?”

 

Peter raises his eyebrows. He hears Lydia choke on her drink.

 

“ _No_ ,” Lydia replies vehemently. “I mean, no. I mean, you’re a nice guy, Scott, but _no_.”

 

“Okay,” Scott says, sounding relieved. Peter can hear the smile through his voice. “Because, you know, I really like Allison, and my best friend, Stiles, he . . . never mind. Anyway, I just wanted to make sure. You’ve been inviting me over a lot, and I know we study, but—okay, never mind.” Scott laughs. “It’s cool.”

 

Lydia is quiet for a moment. “I did want to ask you something, though . . . ” she goes on to say to him.

 

“Yeah?”

 

Peter hears Lydia give Scott the hook, line, and sinker that he taught her to say. He trained her on it for weeks to make sure she said it just right. Lydia insisted that they _ask_ , no biting without permission, and Peter argued it in the beginning.

 

 _People can’t be trusted with the information_ , he said.

 

 _And we can’t trust them to trust us if you just_ bite _people without asking_ , Lydia shot back.

 

It was still a sensitive topic for her, and Peter had the decency to look ashamed and turn his gaze away from her. After that, he agreed to her terms.

 

So far, Lydia has been making all of them.

 

She doesn’t mention anything about bites or werewolves, but she does play into Scott’s desires and fears like Peter taught her to do. Lydia makes it sound like she can offer Scott the world, and while he seems skeptical at first, he finally replies, “Okay . . . but how? What do I have to do?”

 

Peter is drying off a mug and puts it away as Lydia walks Scott into the kitchen by the hand. She sits him down at the island counter on one of the stools, and she meets Peter’s gaze across the room. Lydia nods at him. Peter tosses the dishcloth aside and sits down across from Scott. Scott looks between the two of them, more confused than ever.

 

“Now, you have a choice, Scott,” Peter says to him. He talks to him as if they are discussing any number of normal everyday things. “Yes or no, it’s up to you, and there is no pressure for you to choose either way. The choice is yours to make, but it will make you stronger. It will make you faster. You’ll hardly get sick. You will heal easily. You’ll see better, hear better, even breathe better.” Peter nods at Scott’s throat, which he knows is a sensitive topic for the boy. Then, Peter lifts his chin. “But if you want it, you have to choose yes.”

 

Peter glances up from Scott’s face to look at Lydia. As assured as she was before this, she now looks fearful of the outcome. Peter can smell her fear and sweat. He can hear her heart hammering, and she wrings her hands in front of herself.

 

Scott grins, wrinkling his nose. He looks between Peter and Lydia again. “This is a joke, right?” he asks. “I mean . . . ” But the seriousness neither leaves from Peter or Lydia, and Scott’s face falls. “I mean . . . ”

 

“Yes or no, Scott,” Peter repeats from across the table.

 

Scott begins to look uncomfortable. He shifts on the stool, puts one foot down on the floor. “Maybe I should g—”

 

“Allison,” Lydia quickly recovers, “Allison will like you, Scott.” He pauses at the name, his hands flat on the counter. Peter can hear Scott’s heart hammering out of sync alongside Lydia’s, their panic filling up the near silence of the room. They are both afraid, but for different reasons.

 

Lydia circles behind Scott, gently running her fingertips from one shoulder to the next, drawing a shiver from Scott. Peter watches her, enthralled by the sight. She is playing a game of seduction, grappling at Scott’s weakness with hooks that he cannot see but feels. She is learning, and she is good at it.

 

She stills behind Scott and places her hands on his shoulders, leaning in close to his ear as she lowers her voice to a whisper. “She’ll see you on the team, stronger and quicker than anyone else, and you’ll be the only thing in her eyes. She likes kindness, but she likes a man who can hold his own—and you can be that, Scott. You can be all that Allison wants and more, and you won’t have to keep asking yourself if you’ll ever get up the courage to ask her out because—” Lydia pauses, her lips close enough to Scott’s ear that her breath washes over it as she exhales. “She’ll come to you.”

 

Scott wars with it. Peter can see it on his face. Lydia is a far better seductress than him when it comes to the opposite sex, and she performed greatly. Though there is blatant conflict in Scott’s eyes and his expression, he is firmly rooted upon the stool now. His veins bulge in his arm when he squeezes his fist.

 

After an immeasurable silence, he finally says, “Okay.” It’s a whispered breath. “What do I have to do?”

 

“Hold out your hand,” Peter says, offering his own across the counter. His palm and forearm are turned upward, fingers extended in an open gesture.

 

Scott looks down at it. Slowly, he rolls his sleeve upward—why, he doesn’t seem entirely sure, but he does it anyway—and holds out his arm across the counter just a few inches apart from Peter’s proffered arm.

 

Peter takes Scott’s hand by the wrist.

 

After a long moment of silence in which Peter just seems to be examining Scott’s arm, he finally elongates his canines behind his closed lips where Scott can’t see them.

 

When Peter lurches forward and bites him, Scott jumps in his seat and hollers in pain. He tries to pull away, making a choked sound in his throat, but Lydia holds his shoulders. She holds him down, and she holds him in place.

 

 


	7. Cannibals

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _This is where the dark falls, and cannibals like us are left to roam._  
> 

_* * *_

 

Scott does not fall sick to the bite. He takes to it unlike Lydia, and four days later, the doorbell rings, and Lydia opens it to Scott’s smiling face as he looks between her and Peter with his hands holding both straps of his backpack.

 

“It works,” Scotts says, the smile turning to a grin as he bounces on his heels. “It _works_.” He looks over his shoulder, gesturing down the block. “I ran all the way here!” When he glances back to them, his eyes are sparkling. “I didn’t even need my inhaler.”

 

Lydia looks over her shoulder at Peter, a wary smile barely turning up the corner of her mouth.

 

Peter isn’t sure where the look comes from or what it means, but he joins them at the door. He smiles at Scott.

 

“You should come in,” Peter tells him. He raises his eyebrows. “Oh, you can join us for supper tonight. You can invite your mom,” he adds, trying to show Scott a welcoming and open façade.

 

Scott’s smile falls, though, and Peter reads his face like an open book.

 

He hasn’t told his mom about any of this.

 

“Or not,” Lydia chimes in hastily, smiling at Scott. Her interjection rewards them with another one of Scott’s grins as he turns away from Peter and looks to Lydia.

 

“Yeah, sure,” Scott says, and he hurries inside of their house past her.

 

Lydia closes the door. She looks up at Peter. Her uneasiness is clear. She doesn’t know what to do, and she isn’t sure if she’s doing it right.

 

“You’ll be fine,” Peter tells her softly. He steps forward and touches her shoulder with his hand. Peter has to be careful about what he says in the house with Scott there now that Scott is a werewolf. His hearing will be amplified. “Don’t worry,” he whispers, touching his thumb to her chin. “You’ll be just fine.”

 

Lydia smiles slightly in response, but the uncertainty doesn’t leave her eyes.

 

-

 

It will not be long until the full moon, and as the saying goes, Peter wants to kill two birds with one stone.

 

When Lydia calls Peter from school in a panic because Erica was rushed away in an ambulance after she had a seizure when she fell off the climbing wall, it is the perfect opportunity.

 

“It could be serious,” she urges him, “she might die. You have to _do_ something.”

 

Peter sighs because he doesn’t want to seem too eager.

 

“All right,” he says, and he hangs up.

 

He snatches his jacket in a hurry and heads out the front door with his keys.

 

-

 

Every chart looks the same to him until Peter reaches the one that reads the name he is looking for, and his fingernail scratches over the paper and causes the board to clack against the plastic holder on the door.

 

He slips into the room, finding her asleep on the hospital bed. Peter switches off the controls locking the wheels in place one by one and wheels her quietly out of the room and down an empty hall. No one even notices them. Eventually, as he rolls her out of sight, he sees her starting to wake up. Erica’s head lolls to the side as her eyelids flutter open to the bright fluorescent lights above, and Peter takes a shortcut and finds an empty supplies room to wheel her into.

 

With Scott being more susceptible to female persuasion because of his mother, it was necessary to have Lydia lure him in instead of Peter.

 

However, Peter thinks Erica will be an easy one for him to ensnare on his own.

 

When the bed stills in place, Erica becomes more aware of her surroundings. She looks up at the ceiling at first, eyelids fluttering against the bright light above her that seems to drown out the view of the supply shelves and excess items stacked up around her. She doesn’t move her head completely, but she glances about as best as she can until it becomes futile.

 

“ . . . Where am I?” she finally asks—in such a fragile, soft voice.

 

Peter walks around the bed, slowly coming into her view. Erica lowers her chin and looks at him. He can hear her heart rate rising with each passing second. She doesn’t know who he is, and she doesn’t recognize him. Erica also doesn’t know where she is anymore, and he doesn’t look like a doctor.

 

Peter glances down at the foot of the bed, running his fingers along the plastic bar.

 

“You’re very sick, Erica,” he tells her. When he lifts his eyes to her, Peter notices her eyes light up at the use of her name. He pauses, turning to face her as he puts both hands on the plastic bar. “I know you’re already aware of this,” he adds. “It holds you back from being able to live a normal life, a life you desperately crave. There are people who will tell you they can help you, but the most they can do is put off the pain until it comes again next time, and the next time . . . and the next time.”

 

Erica’s eyes well with tears. It’s an unbearable truth she already knows, but Peter needs to hammer it home until it hurts. Her lip trembles, and he raises his chin, taking on a new tone—one of hope instead of despair.

 

“I am here to tell you that they can’t fix you,” he says, pausing for just a moment, “but I can.”

 

Erica blinks, swallowing past a catch in her throat. She lifts herself from the bed, rising into a sitting position. “Are you a doctor?” she asks him, placing her arm around her waist. “Is there a new surgery to fix what’s wrong with me? To stop the seizures? Because my mother—she doesn’t have the money to pay—”

 

Slowly, Peter shakes his head. “There’s no payment required,” he informs Erica. He lifts his eyebrows. “It’s free.”

 

Erica’s mouth falls open. She appears skeptical, but there’s still hope in her eyes. “How?” she asks. “Will it make the seizures stop? Will it fix me? For good? Will I be better if—” Erica cuts off, her emotions getting the best of her as she speaks of something that means so much to her.

 

Carefully, Peter leans over the bed. He grasps at the covers, slowly pulling them off of her legs as he looks at her. Erica watches him, swallowing again. Once her legs are bare, he reaches out to touch one, smoothing his hand upward along her calf and then underneath it. Her heart is pounding inside of her chest. He reaches out with his other hand, doing the same to her opposite leg.

 

“I can make it all go away,” Peter whispers as he looks her in the eyes.

 

Erica is transfixed, barely afraid at all. She is seduced by the offer easily, and the touch of his hands is turning her on. “Are you a doctor?” she asks quietly.

 

Peter grips her by both ankles and yanks her forward suddenly, causing Erica to gasp. He tilts his head slightly, offering her the smallest of smiles to quell the fear growing in her heart. “Something like that,” he says. He raises his eyebrows once more. “Do you want it?”

 

“Yes,” Erica says immediately.

 

There is no hesitation.

 

Peter finds himself smiling even wider this time, and his eyes begin to glow red.

 

-

 

Like Scott, Erica takes to the bite without any adverse side effects. She shows up at their door looking healthier than ever, a grin slapped on her face and her hand on her hip. To make up for lost time, Erica also flirts with both Scott and Lydia. A vixen in the making, she even looks Peter up and down with appreciation as she runs her tongue along her lips.

 

Erica’s added presence and her peppy attitude crush whatever doubts Scott still had and puts him at ease. Peter even catches Scott and Erica making out in one of the bathrooms one afternoon when they followed Lydia home from school. Scott looks abashed; Erica looks annoyed, and Peter sends them both home.

 

It’s nothing he wasn’t expecting. They each have a lot of new pent up hormones, energy, and aggression to add onto the ones they already have as teenagers. The full moon will put it to good use, though, and Peter will make the most of it.

 

-

 

On the night of the full moon, Erica and Scott tell their parents they are spending the night over at a friend’s house.

 

Anyone else might have locked them up, but Peter does the opposite.

 

Lydia stands at the foot of the staircase with her arms wrapped around her chest. She’s visibly upset. She can’t join them. She isn’t like them, and Peter can see the way she feels alienated by it. That for her own safety, she can’t be a part of this. A bonding experience, one that she is excluded from.

 

Peter approaches her, and Lydia trains her face as best as she can into happiness for them.

 

“You’ll be all right?” Peter asks her, reaching out to touch her chin.

 

Lydia smiles past her sadness for him, and she nods her head. “Yeah,” she says, “I’ll be fine.”

 

Peter leans forward, kissing her on the forehead. When he pulls back, he tells her, “We’ll be back in the morning.”

 

Lydia swallows. “Okay,” she says, barely a whisper.

 

Peter turns away from her, joining Scott and Erica as they wait by the doorway. The three of them must leave together long before sunset. By then, it will be too late. Their new powers as beta werewolves have been affecting them acutely all day, but come nightfall, they won’t be able to hold it back any longer.

 

Peter looks back at Lydia at the doorway. He doesn’t have to tell her twice. She’ll stay in the house tonight like he told her earlier today.

 

Still, it doesn’t erase the look of longing in her eyes.

 

-

 

Come morning, they have killed and fed, and they wake up horrified at the sight of themselves covered in blood. Erica’s panic quickly turns to excitement at what she is capable of, while Scott’s panic turns into him rolling over onto his stomach and heaving up whatever his body hasn’t already digested during the night.

 

Peter takes them to a stream to clean off before he takes them back to the house. Scott latches himself to a toilet for the next three hours, and Erica blares music in the living room and dances around to it in her underwear and t-shirt.

 

When Scott emerges from the bathroom, Peter takes him into the kitchen and sits him down. He offers him something to eat as Lydia fixes a pot of coffee.

 

Scott stares down at the eggs, toast, and bacon. “I can’t,” he says, his voice rough and scratchy.

 

“It was only a deer, Scott,” Peter tells him soothingly. He rests a hand on Scott’s back, grips his shoulder. “We don’t eat people. You know that, right?”

 

Scott swallows past a catch in his throat. “I know,” he says, “but still—”

 

“Just eat something,” Peter urges. He pats Scott on the back and gets up from his seat. “You’ll feel better, I promise.”

 

Erica dances into the kitchen in her underwear, spots Scott’s plate with bacon on it, and says, “Ooh!” She scoops up a piece and bites into it, continuing past him until she’s at the refrigerator. Erica opens it for drink.

 

Lydia looks her up and down, raising her eyebrows. “You know,” she says, “you came here in pants.”

 

“Yeah,” Erica replies. “So?”

 

Lydia widens her eyes, glancing over at Peter.

 

“What?” he asks.

 

Scott looks over his shoulder to see what all the fuss is about and ends up staring at Erica’s lack of pants instead.

 

Lydia rolls her eyes, throwing her hand up in the air as the other one holds her cup of coffee. “Never mind!” she says.

 

Lydia storms out of the kitchen, leaving everyone confused except for Erica, who just shrugs it off and pours herself a glass of milk.

 

-

 

Peter expects Lydia and Erica to grow close because Lydia needs a female figure in her life that isn’t related to werewolf hunters, and yet ever since Erica showed up at their doorstep as a newly changed werewolf, Lydia has treated her with distaste instead of friendship. Peter finds Lydia more often in Scott’s company, while she avoids Erica. Peter frowns. This isn’t what he was hoping for.

 

The pack is divided instead of united.

 

Lydia’s behavior has adverse side effects, too. As she takes up Scott’s time, Erica has no one to spend her time with whenever she comes over.

 

Except for Peter.

 

Erica’s beta personality exhibits a blatant attraction to him since he is her Alpha, but she only flirts with him, occasionally batting her eyelashes or licking her lips to go along with the inappropriate vocabulary. She doesn’t act on her impulses, and Peter doesn’t encourage her. But he also doesn’t discourage her either.

 

Erica helps him organize downstairs one evening as Lydia and Scott are upstairs in Lydia’s room, and Erica’s method of helping takes a separate turn as she starts questioning him about his personal life.

 

“So, why aren’t you married?” she asks.

 

Peter pauses, blinking at the question. It instantly reminds him of Lydia, who had asked him a similar question once upon a time. “Because I’m not,” he simply says, cutting his answer short. Erica and Scott don’t know about him and Lydia, and he intends, at least for now, to keep things that way. It would be too hard to explain to them.

 

He goes back to working until Erica’s hand reaches out and touches his thigh.

 

Peter pauses again, looking down at her hand as she squeezes his thigh. He turns to look at her, and Erica reacts quickly. She crushes into him, catching his mouth with her lips and threading her fingers through his hair as she grasps the back of his head. Peter responds and kisses her back, hauling her into his lap.

 

The kiss doesn’t last very long until Erica pulls away from him to bite his bottom lip between her teeth. When she lets it go, his gaze catches something over her shoulder.

 

Lydia stands in the doorway, staring at them.

 

Peter licks his lips slowly and swallows as his gaze locks with Lydia. This won’t help her relationship with Erica. He sees it plainly in her face as she stands there with stiff posture and her hands balling up into little fists at her sides.

 

Gently, he ushers Erica off his lap, and she looks over his shoulder in confusion to see what has distracted him.

 

Lydia turns away from the sight of them and stalks out of view.

 

“Lydia,” Peter calls out, and he gets up to hurry after her. Erica is the last thing on his mind, after all, so he doesn’t stay to try and explain it to her. He sees Lydia pick up the pace, hurrying toward the staircase. “Lydia!” he calls out again, but she keeps going, faster than before, ignoring him.

 

Peter isn’t sure where she is going at first, but he follows her until he catches her right before she reaches her bedroom door.

 

Peter grasps her arm, pushing her into the wall, and Lydia fights him back as she always does. She scrunches her face and shoves his chest with her free hand. “Let _go_ of me,” Lydia demands, and the impact of her back against the wall causes her bedroom door to open and Scott to emerge.

 

“What’s going on?” Scott asks, his voice rising as he sees the position they’re in.

 

“ _Leave_ , Scott,” Peter commands without looking at the boy. “This is none of your business.”

 

“Are you going to hurt her?” Scott demands. “Because if you hurt her—”

 

Peter’s eyes glow red, and he turns to roar at Scott, canines extending in his fury. Scott backs away, his eyes glowing yellow in response, but he still doesn’t leave.

 

“I think I’ll stay,” Scott tells him, despite the wariness in his voice.

 

Peter turns to Lydia. “Do you _really_ want to do this in front of him?” he asks her.

 

Lydia looks like she is carefully considering her answer. Peter’s grip is still firm on her wrist, pinning it to the wall, and Lydia looks over at Scott with a bored expression on her face. “You can leave, Scott,” she tells him.

 

“Lydia, if he—”

 

“You can _leave_ , Scott,” Lydia says more firmly.

 

Scott looks between Peter and Lydia, huffing in frustration. “I’ll be downstairs,” he tells them, though perhaps more for Lydia’s benefit than anything, and stalks past them. Peter watches him out of the corner of his eyes until he is satisfied that Scott is out of sight and range.

 

“Happy?” Lydia asks him with a sarcastic tone, tilting her head to the left.

 

“You are not leaving,” Peter tells her, and Lydia looks affronted by the demand.

 

“Now you’re going to tell me what I can and can’t do?”

 

“You’re not leaving,” Peter amends carefully, “just because you’re angry at what you saw.”

 

Lydia leans her head off the wall toward him. “Who says I’m angry?”

 

Her retort shocks Peter at first, and he leans away from her. It isn’t the response he expected, and she latches onto the moment.

 

“I don’t care what you do,” she says flippantly. “It’s your life, after all.”

 

Peter notices her bluff, and he calls it.

 

He lets go of her wrist, taking a step back. Peter trains all emotion out of his face, and then he juts a thumb toward the staircase. “So,” he says, “you don’t care if I go back down there and fuck her? Maybe on the couch . . . ” He lowers his hand, shrugging his shoulders. “If you don’t care, then you won’t mind hearing it, will you?”

 

Lydia’s face flushes, and before he knows it, she rushes forward and shoves him.

 

Peter grins at her telling response. He catches her wrists and shoves her back into the wall again, and Lydia attempts to push him, but it only results in her arching her back. She growls and twists, and Peter maneuvers both of her wrists into one hand to grasp her face by the chin. “Ah, there’s my girl,” Peter murmurs atop her lips, and Lydia lurches forward to try and bite him, but he counters it by kissing her hard on the mouth.

 

Lydia struggles, of course, and sinks her teeth into his bottom lip until she draws blood, but Peter has always liked that, so it only arises a groan from his throat in response. When she lets go, he slips his tongue into her mouth, aware of the risk, and his hand over her breast and down her ribcage and up underneath her shirt when he reaches the hem. Lydia stops fighting him after that, and she holds both sides of his face as she kisses him back.

 

Peter unzips her skirt, and it falls. He pushes down the lace hem of her panties, and those fall, too. He runs his hands under her ass and hoists her from the floor, and Lydia wraps her legs around his waist. He pins her against the wall with his body and pulls the button free on his pants, the zipper down, and gets them far enough out of the way before stroking his cock beneath her. Lydia deepens their kiss in her frenzy and moans when she feels the tip of his cock press against her. She wraps her arms around his neck and grips hard with a whimper when Peter pushes in an inch, and then two, and she gasps when he pulls back out again. He kisses her and rubs her with his thumb until she is ready, and then he tries again and finds her wet with only the mildest resistance until he’s in all the way.

 

He’s rough with her because it gets them both off quick. She likes the beginning bite of pain, the slight twinge of discomfort that melts into pleasure as he thrusts into her. Peter discovered that when she started rushing into it, guiding him into her sooner than normal and pushing onto him despite the resistance, burying her face into the mattress and groaning. “Yes, fuck me,” she’d gasp, and the first time Lydia talked dirty to him, Peter didn’t last as long. It wasn’t elegant. It was foul-mouthed expletives, commentary on her own body, and rhetorical questions on exactly what she was for him, and it made him growl and rut into her until his fingers left angry purple bruises on her hips and his teeth left angry red marks on her shoulder where he bit down hard on the fair skin.

 

With her arms around his shoulders now and her fingers in his hair, Peter leans into Lydia’s neck as he makes the most of finding a quick release. They are, after all, in a hallway, and Scott and Erica are just downstairs. They can probably hear everything, Peter thinks, as Lydia scratches his scalp and moans with each thrust of his hips, tilting her head back against the wall and hitting it with a thud. “Fuck me,” Lydia demands in a weak voice, digging her nails mercilessly into his flesh. “Fuck me, fuck me, _fuck_ me. _Harder_.”

 

Peter grasps her ass and complies, kissing and nipping at her chin and neck until her breathing becomes shallow and uneven as her moans grow more erratic. She slumps her upper body against the wall, but arches her lower body into him. It takes him a moment before Peter realizes her head is turned to the side, and so when he turns his head to look, he is only half-shocked by the sight of Erica at the end of the hallway, watching them—and then the knowledge strikes him that Lydia has been staring at Erica, too, staring at Erica and moaning as he fucks her, so Peter closes his eyes and buries his face against Lydia’s chest. He ruts into her until he comes with a guttural noise that abruptly cuts off his movements.

 

Lydia doesn’t come, but she’s satisfied enough despite it. Peter slumps against her and feels her hand run over his hair. She got a show out of it—a show of just who belonged to who. It strikes Peter as funny, but he doesn’t laugh. Instead, he just breathes, barely getting enough air into his lungs, and kisses her chest as he thinks about taking Lydia into her room and finishing what he started with her so she isn’t left with disappointment for the night.

 

He doubts it, he thinks, even as he places a hand against her face and opens his mouth against the hot skin above the buttons of her blouse. He wonders, briefly, if Erica is still watching them—yet when he turns to look again, there is no sight of her near the stairwell anymore.

 

Peter holds Lydia carefully around the waist with his arm, lowering her back onto her feet.

 

“I thought you didn’t want anyone to hear us,” he ventures to say.

 

“Scott heard us,” Lydia tells Peter, tearing her gaze away from the stairs to look him in the eyes. “Erica saw us—” she pauses, glancing upward above the corner of her eyes, squinting thoughtfully, “— _and_ heard us.”

 

“You sound a little too pleased with yourself.”

 

Lydia cuts her eyes back at him. “Maybe,” she whispers, “but I’m not the one who couldn’t control myself long enough not to fuck in the hallway.”

 

She bends down and snatches up her panties and skirt, ducking beneath his arm, and heads to the nearest bathroom a few feet away. Lydia doesn’t even bother to cover her ass, swaying her hips as she walks away from him. It’s purposeful, too, almost a mocking gesture. He clenches his teeth and balls his fists up at his sides as he watches her go, realizing what has just happened between them. Lydia has made none of her displeasure unknown to him, after all.

 

She slams the door behind her, leaving Peter standing alone in the hallway with his pants undone around his ass and a hot flush creeping up into his cheeks from his neck.

 

 


	8. A Cold, Bright Fear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _You cut your teeth on the lack of answers, and you come back home and it don’t feel the same._  
> 

_* * *_

 

Peter fixes his pants and runs his hand through his hair in exasperation. He is on edge and agitated because even though he thinks he has exerted his control over Lydia, it seems as if she has somehow made him look like a fool in the process. A truth he comes face to face with when he takes the stairs two by two and marches into the living room to find Scott and Erica regarding him warily like animals in the dark with their glowing eyes.

 

Each of his betas are on edge, reflecting his own distress, their senses flown into overdrive by the scent of sex still lingering on him. Peter doesn’t care either. He is fueled by aggression at the moment, and Scott looks on the verge of repulsion. Erica herself is just guarded, keeping her distance this time rather than showing interest in him like before. Peter walks right past them into the kitchen. He hears Erica scurrying off up the stairs, and he looks up, wondering where she is going, but Scott remains behind in the living room.

 

Peter pours himself a drink, not that it will give him much satisfaction but it will keep his hands busy, as his beta follows his footsteps cautiously into the kitchen. Scott’s guard is up, and Peter can practically smell the tension thrumming on the air. The boy circles the island counter, regarding Peter with narrowed eyes across it. Peter meets his eyes, and Scott takes a step back.

 

“She’s your nie—”

 

Peter slams his hand down on the counter, causing Scott to jolt away from it. He glares at Scott, his eyes burning a hot red. “I know _what_ she is,” he says viciously, asserting his control over the situation, over his beta. “Do not interfere in matters you don’t understand, Scott.”

 

Scott looks like he wants to fight, but he is smart enough to realize his strengths are no match for Peter’s and he is aware of his own boundaries and weaknesses. He bows this one out, retreating from the kitchen and disappearing from Peter’s sight.

 

Right now, Peter doesn’t care where Scott goes as long as he doesn’t have to deal with the boy’s overindulgent morals. His entire body brims with ferocity, and a single misstep could cause him to make a mistake he can’t take back.

 

He downs his glass, smacking it down on the counter.

 

-

 

Upstairs in her bedroom, Lydia sits on the bed with her hands folded in her lap, staring out the window blankly at a sky that has already turned black.

 

She hasn’t bothered to turn on a light, so the only glow in her room is from the moon and the stars beyond her window. Guilt fills her, as well as shame, and she doesn’t know what to do with them. They’re useless emotions to her. Refusing to cry because she knows now that werewolves have acute senses, Lydia recalls all the times she cried and how Peter always came to her because he must’ve heard.

 

However, she starts to remember all the times she did cry that he didn’t come. It weighs heavily on her mind why he chose some times and not all of them. Every time she pieces together a new bit of information, it feels like there are holes that need filling and Lydia doesn’t have all of the answers. She grasps at straws and comes up empty-handed, and she tries to feel more powerful by exerting control over Peter whenever she can in whatever ways are available, but it only makes Lydia feel unclean somehow in the aftermath.

 

She washed up quickly after what happened in the hallway and put her clothes back on, but she waited until she heard Peter go downstairs before she returned to her room. While she had cleaned off physically, she doesn’t feel any different on the inside. Lydia isn’t happy with the person she is becoming. She isn’t happy with how she has to handle Peter or how she tries to skirt around him. She isn’t happy that Peter knows things and hides them from her, and Lydia doesn’t want to act like him even if it means balancing the scales, but that is exactly what she has been doing because she doesn’t want to be in the dark anymore.

 

Yet here she is, in the dark all over again.

 

She glances down at her bed, running her fingers over the covers.

 

She wants to go downstairs and pretend everything is fine, but she doesn’t want to face anybody and she doesn’t really want to pretend. The truth is she’s tired of always being the one to show vulnerability. It’s always her and never Peter, and she wants to see him hurt.

 

She wants to see him crack.

 

Lydia wants to know if this is all a game to him or if, somewhere buried deep inside, he actually cares about her.

 

When a soft knock comes at her door, Lydia squeezes her eyes shut and grips the covers hard in her fist. It is probably Peter, and she doesn’t want to see him right now. She isn’t so sure she can train her face to be steely and prideful when she is feeling like the exact opposite of both. She swallows past a hard knot near the top of her throat and gives herself a few deep breaths before she answers the knock.

 

“Who is it?” she calls. Thankfully, her voice is as steady as stone.

 

There is no answer, but she hears the doorknob twist and the door push open. A tremble briefly enters her hands, and Lydia closes her eyes and trains them to be still. She thinks of her mother telling her she’s strong, and it makes it easier to be that way. Lydia smiles, recalling her mother’s face behind her eyes, and hears the door to her bedroom quietly click shut.

 

Lydia opens her eyes.

 

“You’re not mad at me, are you?” comes Erica’s casual voice from behind her. It shocks Lydia into turning around on her bed to look at her. She wasn’t expecting it to be Erica.

 

For some reason, that was the last person she expected it to be.

 

Lydia forces a sugary sweet fake smile to show her annoyance. She is sure, even in the dark, that Erica of all people can see it. “This is my room,” she informs her, “and you can leave now.”

 

“I just walked _in_ ,” Erica says, unfazed by Lydia’s response. Lydia watches as she walks up to a lamp and switches on a light. Erica smiles at her now that the light is on. “Besides,” she adds, grinning, “I just asked you a question. The polite thing to do is to answer.”

 

Lydia’s eyes grow even wider in disbelief. “You cannot be serious,” Lydia says. “Get out.”

 

Erica kneels down onto the bed opposite of Lydia. “You just fucked him in the hallway,” she tells Lydia, holding up her hands in a mock surrender. “I got it. The message was loud and clear, so you can drop this tough girl act and talk to me.” Erica scoots across the bed until she is sitting right beside Lydia, their arms and shoulders brushing together. Ever since she became a werewolf, she doesn’t recognize personal space anymore. It’s like she has forgotten all about it. “So, c’mon,” Erica urges, nudging Lydia’s arm. “Answer me. Are you really mad at me over that?”

 

Lydia stares at Erica with her mouth open until she manages to catch herself and closes it. She looks away, returning her gaze to the window. “No,” Lydia finally tells her, finding the honesty easier than she thought it would be, “I’m not mad at you.”

 

“But you’re mad, _aren’t_ you?”

 

Lydia lowers her eyes, feeling the smallest smile twitch at the corner of her lips. She raises her eyebrows in the dark. “Not at _you_ ,” she finally offers.

 

Erica braces her palms against the edge of the bed. “Good,” she says, “because if I had _known_ . . . ” Erica reconsiders this. “Well, actually, I would have still done it, if I’m honest.”

 

Lydia doesn’t laugh, but the urge is there. She smiles in her amusement instead. “Was it the only time?” she dares to ask.

 

“Yeah,” Erica says, shrugging her shoulders. “You got lucky.”

 

Lydia wants to say _don’t do it again_ , but she remembers Jackson and it’s hard for her to be a hypocrite. Her hands fidget in her lap, and Erica’s keen senses notice something is still wrong. Erica reaches over, and she grasps one of Lydia’s hands in hers.

 

Lydia stills, looking down at it.

 

“I want us to be friends,” Erica says bluntly, throwing it out there. She squeezes Lydia’s hand. “Not enemies.” It’s comforting to hear, but the uncertainty is still there beneath the surface. Erica leans in closer, lowering her voice to a whisper. “So, whatever you’re thinking, you can stop.”

 

Finally, Lydia squeezes Erica’s hand back, inciting another question from Erica.

 

“This is a lot more complicated than just tonight, isn’t it?”

 

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Lydia says quickly. “Not right now.”

 

“Okay,” Erica says, shrugging. She pulls her feet up onto the bed. “But you don’t have to feel weird about it. I have a secret, and you’re the only girl who knows. I haven’t told anyone else I’m a werewolf.” Erica knits her forehead together as she thinks about it. “I don’t think it would work out too great to admit that. It’d be a prank or a horror story. It’s not something you can just _share_ with others, you know.”

 

Lydia sees where Erica is going with this.

 

She glances over at Lydia, tilting her head. “You have a secret, too,” Erica adds quietly. She leans in again. “Am I the only girl who knows?”

 

Lydia doesn’t say anything out loud, but she finds the courage to nod her head.

 

Erica nods her head, too, not prying too far given how Lydia told her she didn’t want to talk about it. Erica respects her decision and looks away, changing the subject to something else. “I do have one question, though.”

 

“What’s that?”

 

Erica turns back to her, blinking big brown eyes in the dark. “Why aren’t you like the rest of us? You know, a werewolf?”

 

Lydia feels her lips tighten. She looks away from Erica, training her gaze on the window again. “I don’t know,” she says.

 

“Were you bitten?” Erica inquires. “Like me? Like Scott?”

 

The memory makes Lydia’s jaw tighten as well, but her eyes remain bright and clear. “Yes.”

 

Erica is quiet at first. “It didn’t work?”

 

Lydia stares at the moon hanging low on the horizon, glowing a pale pink-tinged silver. She remembers being sick. She remembers Peter telling her that her body rejected the bite. Lydia feels the weight of being different like a crushing pressure on her chest. Why didn’t it take with her, but it did with everyone else? What is so different about her?

 

Lydia thinks Peter was drawn to Erica because Erica is the success.

 

She is the failure.

 

Slowly, Lydia shakes her head. Her eyes fall to her lap. “No,” she answers softly, “it didn’t work.”

 

“Do you know why?”

 

“No,” Lydia repeats, staring forward blankly. “I don’t know why.”

 

Erica is quiet after that, but she doesn’t leave. After some silence, she asks, “Does Peter know?”

 

Lydia glances over at her. “That’s something I’ve been trying to figure out.”

 

Erica purses her lips. “Well, maybe I can—”

 

Another knock on her door cuts off Erica, and they both whirl around to face it. Lydia’s heart races. It could be Scott, but it could be Peter. Even if it is Peter, she can’t keep him out forever. She’ll have to face him again. Sooner or later.

 

“Yes?” Lydia calls out, and following her inquiry, the door opens slowly.

 

Scott stands in the doorway with a dark look on his face. He gazes down the hall before stepping inside her room, shutting the door behind himself with a quiet push. He takes a few steps into her room before pausing a foot from her bed, the shadows obscuring his face from the left. Lydia can see now that the expression on his face is more troubled than anything, and it only grows more serious as they stare at each other in silence.

 

“We need to talk,” Scott says.

 

-

 

In the weeks that follow, Peter begins to notice something strange.

 

By the second week, it becomes plain to him that Lydia, Scott, and Erica are no longer divided amongst themselves. That in and of itself is strange to him, given the events of that night with Erica. He finds all three of them together now more often than not, with Erica and Scott flanked on either side of Lydia at most times. The only time Peter is ever alone with Lydia in their own house is at night when everyone else is away.

 

That is, if Erica or Scott don’t stay the night. Sometimes they do, and they claim a spot in Lydia’s room if they do. Sometimes it is just Erica, and sometimes it is just Scott, and sometimes it’s both of them. Scott sleeps on the floor in a sleeping bag. Erica, however, isn’t afraid to take the bed with Lydia. When he goes into Lydia’s room during the day while she is away at school, Peter can smell Erica’s scent all over Lydia’s sheets, tainting them.

 

He grasps early on that they think they are protecting her from him.

 

Peter isn’t happy about it, which is an understatement. His nerves are shot by the idea that they are cutting her off from him, keeping her away. Lydia herself says nothing about it, and he can’t seem to get her alone long enough just to bring it up with her. Peter dances around his betas every day, never quite getting close enough to Lydia because he is so focused on training them. They act like nothing is wrong anymore. They laugh and enjoy themselves until they are sore from his rigorous exercises.

 

He is less forgiving now than he was before, an edge they have begun to pick up on slowly but surely. Peter sees the looks on their faces as they lie on the ground after he has thrown them with over half his might, and they stare up at him with narrowed eyes, hesitant glances shared between them.

 

“That’s enough for today,” Peter says, turning and walking away from Scott and Erica.

 

They take their beatings well, but it doesn’t get him any closer to Lydia.

 

-

 

On the eve of her sixteenth birthday, Peter passes by her room and discovers she is alone in it. Erica and Scott aren’t here today, and he pushes open the door until he is face to face with Lydia sitting on the edge of her bed. Her hands are in her lap, and she is dressed up as if she is going somewhere—and yet Lydia is sitting patiently on her bed as if waiting for something.

 

She looks up at him when he enters, and Peter pauses in the doorway. Lydia was waiting for him. He sees it in her expression, and he wants to say something, but he feels the unusual prick at the back of his neck that raises his hairs on end. It is a moment of quiet before an avalanche comes tumbling down. Peter senses this. Instinctively, he retreats a step.

 

“I’m moving out,” Lydia says casually from the bed as she looks away from him. She smoothes her hand over the covers and pats them once, looking up at Peter again. He is frozen at the doorway.

 

“That’s not possible,” Peter answers her. He steps into her room, all cautiousness about proceeding forward forgotten now. “You’re only sixteen.”

 

Lydia purses her lips and shrugs her shoulders as if it’s nothing. “You won’t say anything,” she tells him.

 

Peter advances with quick steps, his voice hurried and angry. “And what makes you think I won’t—”

 

Lydia glances up at him with her eyes only. “If you report it, I’ll report you.”

 

He freezes again. This time just two feet in front of her.

 

Peter feels his fists clenching at his sides. He feels his heart pounding ferociously in his ribcage, and the prick of sweat begins to form on his forehead. Peter thinks he knows what she means. She can’t know about her uncle, so the only thing that comes to mind is their relationship. Their unorthodox relationship.

 

He wants to hiss _you came to me_ , but he doesn’t. It won’t solve anything. It doesn’t matter what he says, anyway. She is underage, and he is not.

 

It will all come down on him if she says anything at all.

 

“Why?” he grinds out, digging his nails into the palm of his hands. It is the only thing he can think to ask, the only word he can form on his tongue. It feels heavy in his mouth, thick and dry.

 

Lydia lays one of her arms over her lap and crosses her legs at the knees, leaning back. She is unusually cool about this. He cannot even detect a skip in her heart.

 

“You haven’t been honest with me,” Lydia says, looking him straight in the eyes. “You’ve been keeping secrets from me. You’re becoming violent and possessive when I’m not even the one who made the mistake, and I don’t like it and I don’t need it.” Lydia leans forward, never breaking eye contact with him. “You don’t _own_ me,” she tells him firmly.

 

“I forgave you,” Peter says, each word on edge, “for _Jackson_.”

 

Lydia has the decency to look ashamed at that, her cheeks flushing red in the low light as she turns away from him. “I know—”

 

“You’re going to hold this against me?” he asks, cutting her off. “A kiss? You’re going to hold a kiss against me when I forgave you for—”

 

“I don’t know _why_ you forgave me!” Lydia hollers, standing up from the bed and getting in his face.

 

Peter yells his response right back. “ _Because I_ —”

 

He cuts off mid-sentence, staring forward in horror at Lydia’s face. She is staring at him, too, shock written plainly on her features as she breathes slowly through her mouth. For a moment, he is locked with her gaze, and then abruptly, he turns away. The moment of stillness and silence disappears, replaced once more with agitation and quick movements; too quick to allow either of them time to think to acknowledge what may have passed between them.

 

“Did Scott put you up to this?” Peter asks immediately with his back to her, his restless feet taking him across the room.

 

“Scott has nothing to do with—”

 

Peter turns around to face her again. “Erica,” he says with a resolute firmness as he advances on Lydia once more. “Did Erica tell you to do this? Because I _will_ —”

 

“If you harm either one of them,” Lydia threatens, emotion clouding her voice, “I swear there won’t be an ‘us’ for you to try to defend.”

 

Peter stops. Her words have given him pause. _If_ , she said. It’s such a telling word for her to use, even if she began this as a demand that was not up for negotiation. Peter senses there is a way for him to settle this, a way for him to fix the damage done. _Answers_ , he thinks. _She wants answers_.

 

Lydia has still not come to terms with him hiding what he is from her for so long, among other things they have not taken the time to discuss or sort out. She wants footing. She wants control. She wants a say. She has been trying to make that for herself by picking the pack, by building it through choice if not bite, but it is not enough for her. She still feels alienated, and this is her trying to regain control.

 

She would’ve made a fine Alpha female, Peter thinks. He laments for it.

 

If Lydia wants him to be honest with her, then he’ll be honest with her. While it has never been one of his better policies or one of his best qualities, Peter knows when to make an exception and be acquiescent.

 

This is one of those times.

 

Peter approaches her with slow, cautious steps, but Lydia still backs herself into the bed, the backs of her knees hitting the mattress and her left palm catching the edge of it. When he stands only inches away, Peter stares for a long moment until Lydia’s eyelids flutter uncomfortably, and then he kneels down in front of Lydia one leg at a time until he is on the ground.

 

Peter reaches past her. He places his hands on the bed at either side of her, never touching her but maintaining the closeness. He doesn’t look up at her. He grips the mattress hard in both fists. “What do I have to do?” he asks, a voice so quiet that he hears Lydia’s breath hitch above him in response.

 

This is what she was looking for, he realizes. Peter isn’t sure how real the threat is yet, though. He is not sure he wants to find out.

 

Lydia swallows. “What am I?” she asks, and Peter glances up. Lydia raises her chin and shakes her head at once. “—And _don’t_ you tell me you don’t have _some_ idea,” she adds quickly. “I saw those books, Peter. I know you’ve been looking for answers. I know you’ve been talking to people. You’re a werewolf. You _have_ to know something. You can’t know nothing . . . ”

 

If there’s one thing he has learned about Lydia Martin, it’s that she only calls him _Peter_ when she’s opening herself up to him and allowing herself to be vulnerable. She tacks on a title for only three reasons: to be distant, for other people’s benefit, or to be purposefully audacious and vulgar. Either way, there is a wall with all three.

 

When she just calls him _Peter_ , there is no wall.

 

“I have an idea,” he says slowly, maintaining eye contact, “but I don’t know for sure. I searched your room for clues, but . . . ” Peter lowers his gaze, biting down on his lip. The gesture is real, not feigned. “All I found was a box of condoms in your closet. That’s when I suspected there was someone else, so I—”

 

“What _am_ I?” Lydia demands a second time. She doesn’t want to talk about this. Peter sees it in the way she clenches her fists at her sides. Her whole body is taut. He looks up at her again.

 

“I think you may be a banshee,” Peter tells her.

 

Lydia flexes her fingers and breathes a little slower. There is a light of disbelief in her eyes. She doesn’t need him to tell her what a _banshee_ is. That much he knows. Lydia is familiar with the textbook definition in and out as well as all the myths surrounding it, but she can’t make it real. She can’t reconcile the word to herself, and her hands begin to tremble. Peter looks at them.

 

Cautiously, he reaches for one. He knows she might pull away, but she doesn’t. Peter takes her hand into his, holding it gently for a moment, and runs his thumb over her fingers before he places the knuckle of her hand against his cheek. He doesn’t look at her yet, though.

 

“You don’t have to be afraid, Lydia,” he tells her. “I can help you.” Peter lifts his eyes to her face then, letting her look into his. “I can help you,” he implores her, widening his eyes, “ _if_ you stay. If you leave—” Peter shakes his head. “There’s nothing I can do if I’m not there.”

 

It’s emotional blackmail, and Peter knows it. On the other hand, though, it’s true. He can’t help her if he isn’t there, and if something happens, he won’t know until it’s too late.

 

It’s for her own good. Really, it is.

 

Lydia takes a deep breath. She sits down on the bed with an air of decisiveness to the movement. There is no hesitation or resignation in the gesture. However, he is wary of moving too soon after Lydia. Peter doesn’t want to be hopeful for an outcome that may not come, so he remains kneeling before her, waiting for her to make the first move or say the first thing.

 

“That’s not fair,” Lydia says softly, looking right at him.

 

Peter exhales a long breath. “It’s the truth,” he offers, and she knows it. He raises his chin. He ought to give her a way out to absolve himself of culpability. “But if you want—”

 

“What do _you_ want?” Lydia throws back at him.

 

Peter furrows his brow, tilting his head as he pulls it back. Lydia’s question has genuinely caught him off guard and given him a pause. She wants an answer. He can’t ignore the question. “I want you to stay,” he answers without thinking.

 

Lydia leans forward slowly, the features of her beautiful face all sharp-edged and severe in the dim light. “And what would you do to _get_ it?”

 

 _It isn’t working_ , Peter realizes, and the first moment of true panic finally hits him. His eyes widen, his mouth opens without words, and the crushing weight on his heart feels real—like her fingers, grasping on tight and squeezing hard. Peter can pretend all he wants about where he thinks the power lies, but in that moment he is her slave and the noose is tightening around his throat like the scorching chafe of her silver chained necklace. The end of the rope lies in her hand.

 

He knows he looks like he is on the verge of pleading with her, but Peter doesn’t ask _please_ for his own benefit. He won’t. He never has, and he never will. He grits his teeth until his jaw grinds, and he lets go of her hand to grasp the sheets in his fists. Peter tightens them until the veins are bulging, until he’s trying everything within his willpower not to rage as she expects him to—giving Lydia the proof of everything she has accused him of—and not to break down because he can’t.

 

He has no more tricks to use.

 

Peter lowers his head, gripping the bed sheets tighter, and he hisses inward as he tries to think of anything, anything at all, to stop this from happening, to stop her from leaving, but he has nothing and all of the hallways look bleak and empty in his head.

 

Lydia reaches out to him, cupping his face in her hands softly. She raises his face until she can look at him, unmasked and vulnerable, and Lydia looks so peaceful and calm as she smiles at him. He thinks he must look horrified as she reaches up to graze her fingertips against his temple and into his hair with soothing and soft strokes. “Shh,” she whispers tenderly, her eyes following the path of her hand through his hair. “It’s all right, Peter. It’s all right.”

 

Peter is frozen in place as he stares at her. He blinks only when he feels Lydia’s thumb catch on his ear lobe as she lowers her hand to his face again. Gently, she presses her hand to his cheek and guides him to lay his head in her lap upon her knees. He lets her, following her hand, and then feels her fingers in his hair again as the side of his face lays against her leg.

 

He pulls his hands off the bed, places them on either side of her thighs, and holds Lydia in a firm grip as he stares outward numbly.

 

Peter swallows against the dryness in his throat.

 

He realizes, with perfect clarity, exactly what has just happened between them.

 

 


	9. Fate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _You think you have this all planned out._  
> 

_* * *_

 

His eyes stare into the dark, catching on ripples of light sent in from the window as Lydia lies sleeping peacefully in his arms. Peter can’t sleep, though. There is too much on his mind. Lydia has grown restless as of late in regards to the killer of her parents, and everyday she keeps inquiring when will they be ready. _Are we ready?_ she asks him one day, and then another and another. Each time her voice is laced with hopeful tones, with a glint of optimism that always reaches her eyes as she gazes at him. Peter looks her in the eyes when he shakes his head before he turns away from her.

 

He always looks her in the eyes, so she understands the gravity of it.

 

The problem is Peter isn’t so sure that Scott and Erica will be able to handle what it requires, and he can’t ensure their safety. He doesn’t tell Lydia this. It will only make her worry for them. He doesn’t believe she will pull the plug on their plans if he divulges it, but he thinks about the consequences of laying the guilt on her doorstep if something happens to them. He will handle it just fine. If she knows and she still says yes, the blood will be on her hands, too. Peter isn’t so sure what it will do to her.

 

He glances down at Lydia in his arms with her back pressed to his chest and her breathing slow and steady. He feels her warm breath upon his forearm, her chin tilted downward as she lies in his embrace. Lydia has accepted staying with him, but he feels weaker for it. She has gotten under his skin, wormed her way in and burrowed deep into the dark crevasses inside of him, and made her home in his abyss. He can feel her twisting in his gut sometimes. When she smiles, the glints of her eyes and teeth are like needles piercing his skin.

 

Peter thinks he knows what this is. _Obsession_ comes to mind. The way he stares at her and imagines dragging teeth along her flesh and consuming her moans with his lips as he finds his pleasure in her, it fills his waking thoughts. He never tires of them. Each time he claims her, Peter thinks he will be sated, but it only grows worse and more unbearable. He growls inside like the animal he is, desiring it all and never finding his peak. He cannot reach it. His dreams grow darker, and his eyes develop shadows in them. Lydia sees them; he knows she sees them, but she never says anything about it.

 

As she exhales a long breath in her sleep, Peter glides the tips of his fingers over her forehead, brushing away loose hair from her skin. Lydia stirs slightly, but she doesn’t wake. He curls her hair behind her ear and nips at her earlobe, cups her chin and draws her closer to him. Lydia moans softly in her sleep, coming awake slowly as he sucks softly on her earlobe.

 

She turns in his arms, lying at an angle with her back against his chest, and Peter runs his tongue along the shell of her ear. Lydia shivers and opens her mouth, a sound escaping her lips, and as Peter holds her chin, he slips a thumb past those lips into her mouth. Lydia opens her eyes as she closes her lips around him and sucks. He pulls back from her to look at her face, to watch her cheeks hollow out and her eyes gleam in the dark. He is plenty aroused by the sight of her sucking, even if it is only his thumb. The movement of her tongue underneath the digit is enough to remind him of what she can do to him. He pushes it deeper, and Lydia tilts her head back into the pillow, her eyelids growing heavy.

 

Peter pulls his thumb out of her mouth and captures her lips with a searing kiss as Lydia cups the back of his head and draws him down to her. Her fingers graze his scalp, and he deepens the kiss with his tongue. As sure as she seemed about leaving him and despite her threats, she has no reservations about indulging her sexual appetites with him now. He nips at her lips until they are blossoming red beneath his teeth. His hand passes over her neck and trails down her chest, and she moans beneath the touch. Peter can feel her arching against the bed.

 

He climbs over Lydia as she lies on her back, but his intention is not for himself tonight. Lydia parts her legs, giving him a comfortable place to settle atop of her, and Peter dips his head lower, hovering his mouth just above her chest.

 

Peter glances up at her. She stares down at him, breathing harder for it. He curls a finger beneath the strap of Lydia’s nightgown, pulling it off of her shoulder. He does the same to the other side before freeing her breasts and covering one with his mouth and the other with his hand. Lydia arches into him, moaning aloud at the ceiling, and her legs clench at his sides. He tends to her slowly with lips and teeth and tongue, grazing his thumb over the sensitive nipple in hand. He makes small circles around and over it until she is pushing up into his hand, his mouth, gripping the sheets for something to hold onto that isn’t him. She doesn’t want to disturb what he is doing.

 

Pulling her nightgown a little lower with one hand, he leaves the hard nipple in his mouth for the other. He sucks and nips until Lydia whimpers and arches into him yet again, clutching at the back of his head with desperate fingers in his hair. Her sounds rouse him further, and he pulls back, his mouth leaving her breast, to gaze up at her again. Feeling the loss of his kisses and the pass of his tongue over her skin, Lydia turns her eyes downward to see what he is doing.

 

When he gets eye contact with her, he keeps it and moves lower down her body, kissing a small trail along the smooth fabric of her nightgown. He moves all the way down until his shoulders are between her legs, and then he places a soft kiss on her left thigh as his hand holds her just below the knee. He watches Lydia as he drags his lips lower to the inner corner of her thigh near her panties. Lydia is soaked; he can smell it. Peter nuzzles her with the tip of his nose against the wet cotton. A heated moan escapes her, and she arches at him, but he pulls back from her.

 

A distraught whimper escapes her at his actions, and Peter smiles as he returns his lips to kiss her at the edge of her panties, his finger curling under and pulling it back. Lydia attempts arching into him again, but he lays his cheek to her thigh to prevent it and reaches around to hook two fingers beneath her waistband and pull them down slowly. She lifts her hips, making it easier, and he sits up on the bed to look down at her as he pulls her panties off all of the way.

 

She brings her legs closer to her and holds her knees together when he makes it halfway, but once they are off and in his hands, Lydia raises her head and props herself up on her forearms. She doesn’t part her legs for him, choosing instead to stare at him and wait for him to make a move.

 

Peter drops the underwear, thin cotton and lace, and holds her thigh as he runs his other hand up the length of her leg. He parts her knees slowly with his hands as her breathing quickens, and then he lowers his own body back to the bed and watches as her head falls to the pillow and hits it, her face rolling into her curls. Peter wants to make this good, but he wants to make this slow; enough to torture her into thrashing or begging. He enjoys seeing her come undone.

 

He slips his arms beneath her legs to make the position comfortable, curling his hands around her thighs to hold her. His lips press, soft and barely touching, to her inner thigh again. It’s a torturous spot for her, close but not close enough. When they leave her, Peter flicks his tongue out slowly along the heat of her skin. Lydia whines in the back of her throat, lifting her head to look at him and then hitting the pillow again. She arches her back against the mattress.

 

“Please,” she begs, and he knows exactly where she wants him. He is taking his sweet time on purpose. Peter licks his lips and lays his next kiss closer, but still not quite there. Her skin is hotter here, and her next whimper almost sounds on the verge of tears. “ _Please_.”

 

He uses only his tongue on her, and just barely the tip, to touch the sensitive clit that is already wet from the rest of her. He feels Lydia’s nerves tighten up in her legs, and then she shudders all over atop the bed. He keeps it simple at first and slow, teasing her in just that one spot with the softest movements of his tongue. When Lydia finally tries to buck into him, Peter grips her thighs firmly with his hands and holds her in place.

 

Lydia gasps. She rises onto one of her elbows to look at him again, and he meets her gaze. Peter holds it, gripping her thighs hard and tilting his head just slightly as his tongue delves lower and more fully against her, running from the bottom to top. Her head falls back; she moans at the ceiling. He repeats the motion over and over, his tongue never leaving her, until Lydia has fallen back to the bed and is arching rigidly against it, the muscles of her thighs tight and then loose and her toes curling up and locking, and her vocal chords being put to good use.

 

When he is done teasing her, he sucks her clit and removes one of his arms from beneath her legs and pushes two fingers inside of the slickness and heat between her legs. Peter curls them upward inside of her and moves his hand rapidly as he sucks hard, getting her off with multiple orgasms in a row. He can feel each and every one of them as her muscles suddenly spasm at his touch, how they jerk in awkward directions as she loses herself; she can’t fake this with him. He knows.

 

Peter kisses her intimately just above where his fingers are still inside of her, a tender brush of lips until he withdraws his hand. He kisses her between her legs like it is her mouth, delving his tongue inside her one more time, and the moan from her throat is broken and full of ache.

 

He cleans his fingers by sucking them off before grabbing her thigh and holding her leg upright, and he places a searing kiss to the flesh. He works his way back up her body slowly, lips dragging a trail of unforgiving kisses, until he is above her and tearing off his shirt. Peter covers her, hand firmly on the side of her face, as he kisses her and rolls his hips. Lydia moves with him, gasping between their lips, an urgent passion embedded deep in the need for contact. It’s all consuming like a fire rushing up around them, burning too quickly, searing everything in its path.

 

He gets his pants off, and then he helps Lydia with removing her nightgown. She wraps her legs around him, and he pushes inside of her; her sounds fill up the air around him as Lydia gasps, desperate and eager and demanding. She grasps the back of his neck hard, and Peter reaches behind her head as well. He gets a grip on her hair, wraps it around his knuckles, and pulls downward until her neck is strained and her back is raised from the bed. He is careful with her, knowing his strength. Her mouth opens with the softest of moans, her throat bare before him, and then Peter pushes in all the way.

 

Lydia cries out. Even though he has her locked in the position with his fist in her hair, she arches harder. Peter nips at her chin, and then he lowers his face to her neck, her breasts, to scent the sweet smell of her skin dappled with sex and sweat from their lovemaking. Peter pulls out before bottoming out again. Lydia swears at the ceiling, her skin flushing red in the moonlight, and Peter pulls out and fills her again with an indolence that borders on agonizing.

 

He takes on a deliberate leisurely pace, favoring the slow slide of his cock in her heat rather than the harsh pound of his hips. Lydia rakes her nails along his back, and he suffers angry red marks that heal in the wake of her passing hands. Peter tugs harder down on her hair as he leans in close to her throat, breathing in her scent as he sinks into her again and again. _Mate_ , comes the thought, her muscles taut before him, her sweat and blood known to him, and her breasts ripe as she arches into him.

 

He releases her hair, clasping the back of her neck and moving his face lower on her chest until he is between her breasts. He kisses them, giving them attention, until she wraps an arm around his neck as well, fingers raking against his scalp.

 

Peter isn’t sure how long it lasts, but it seems to last for hours. Lydia reaches her peak more than once, and when he’s sated enough to find his own release, Peter forgoes long and leisurely thrusts in favor of speed. Lydia clasps onto him hard, each little sound from her lips torturous against his ear. He grasps onto the metal bars of the headboard as his thrusts become more aggressive. Not for his benefit, but hers. They are so close that her head might hit it with the force he is putting into it now, but his arm prevents them from getting too close.

 

When he comes, it feels as though all the strength in his body leaves with it. With a strangled groan in the back of his throat, Peter loses his grip and his balance. It hits him hard, harder than anything he’s felt in a long time, but he doesn’t move off her immediately. He braces his knuckles against the bed, keeping some of his weight off of Lydia, but lays his cheek against her collarbone.

 

Lydia doesn’t say anything. Her hand comes up to rest in his hair, her breathing slow and ragged. Her fingers run along his scalp as he lies there, her chest rising and falling with each labored breath. Eventually, he moves off of her to lie on the bed beside her. She doesn’t go to him at once. Peter has to turn his head and look at her.

 

“Come here,” he says in a low voice.

 

Lydia shifts closer to him on the bed, but she doesn’t drape herself on him. Peter turns on his side and puts an arm around her, settling his chin on her shoulder. It is comforting, less aggressive than his dominant behavior before, and she slides easily into it, draping an arm over his. Peter feels the weight of his thoughts start to leave him, and his eyes close as a silence fills the room. The air is cold. Lydia shivers beside him.

 

Peter opens his eyes briefly, disturbing their position for a moment to sit up and grab the covers near their feet. He pulls them over him and her both and settles wordlessly back into his former position. Lydia stills all of a sudden beside him, though. Feeling it, Peter reopens his eyes. He lifts his head and glances at her.

 

“What?” he asks.

 

Lydia is taken aback that he even bothered to ask. “Nothing,” she answers him.

 

Peter isn’t going to argue it. There are some things he will question. This isn’t one of them, so he lays his head back down and ignores it.

 

She shifts in his arms, turning her back to him and snuggling into place. He pulls himself closer until he is flush against her and the silence is a gentle hum instead of a piercing disquiet. Lydia asks no questions and starts no conversations. Peter almost expects her to. She is thrumming with a curious energy, but she keeps it all to herself and says nothing, settling instead into a peaceful sleep beside him.

 

Sated for the moment, he finds rest at last.

 

-

 

Over breakfast the next morning, Lydia tips her head sideways as she twists her spoon in the air. She purses her lips. “What are we?” she asks.

 

It’s not a question Peter can say he was expecting. He pauses, glancing up at her. She has a perfect look of innocence on her face. He blinks, considering his answer carefully.

 

“What do you mean?” he chooses to ask instead, resuming his task.

 

“I mean, what are we,” Lydia repeats. “Obviously, this isn’t normal. It’s not like . . . ”

 

“It’s not like what?”

 

Her jaw tightens slightly, teeth clenching behind her cheeks. Finally, she loosens up and exhales a tense breath. “Never mind.”

 

Peter stirs sugar into his tea. Steam rises from the cup, the aroma filling his nose.

 

“We’re family,” he answers. Lydia’s fidgety movements still, and her bottom jaw slides to the left, her eyes locking onto a spot on the tabletop’s surface. He can’t be sure, but it smells like disappointment wafting off of her. Lydia keeps her face under control, though, her expression blank.

 

“Not the answer you were looking for?” Peter ventures to ask her.

 

She blinks rapidly, still staring at the table. Lydia shrugs.

 

Peter takes a sip of the hot tea before setting his cup aside. He circles the counter until he is beside her. He leans in close, his fingers curling along the shell of her ear. The feather light touch invokes a shiver in her.

 

“We’re family,” he repeats. “A _pack_.” Peter turns his hand, running his knuckles along the smooth skin of her cheek. “There is nothing stronger than that, Lydia. If you’re looking for another word, you won’t find one.” With a gentle grip, Peter takes her chin between his thumb and forefinger and turns her until she is facing him. “I’m not some boyfriend you’ve picked up and can cast aside,” he says in a low voice. Peter raises his eyebrows. Slowly, he shakes his head. “That’s not how this works.”

 

Lydia narrows her eyes. A part of her doesn’t like what he’s said. Another part of her, however, is satisfied with his explanation, but she’ll fight it because it’s in her nature. “What if I wanted to leave you?”

 

“You don’t,” Peter murmurs softly, running the tip of his finger down her neck and along the collar of her button-down shirt.

 

“ _If_ ,” Lydia repeats, stronger than before, “I did, what would you do?”

 

Peter blinks slowly, imagining the idea for only a brief moment. If Lydia left him for another, he thinks he would kill the man who took her from him. If she left to be alone and on her own, he thinks he would let her go. Peter wouldn’t hold her prisoner. She would hate him. There would be no joy in that idea. None at all.

 

His gaze moves across her face as these thoughts race through his head. When he meets her eyes again, Peter speaks with finality. “We both know I can’t make you stay.”

 

Lydia breathes out, raising her chin. Peter runs his thumb over it, acknowledging the small look of triumph in her eyes. She doesn’t want to be perceived as weak in his eyes, nor does she want to be a person without choice, but if only she knew that he saw her as anything but weak. Her strength is evolving. If not physically, then mentally and emotionally. She is a match, even for him.

 

 _Maybe even better than me_ , he thinks.

 

“You can’t,” she whispers, and he knows this. The knowledge of it burns.

 

Peter opens his mouth to speak, but Lydia places her finger against his lips and silences him. Leaning into him, she kisses her finger. Peter closes his eyes, but he doesn’t feel her lips. Her finger falls, and she touches her lips to him as her hand touches his face. Before he can barely return it, she pulls away.

 

Lydia finishes her breakfast and walks out the door. She looks back and smiles at him, but then she’s gone.

 

-

 

“Is it possible,” Lydia asks a few days later, not without hesitancy, “that whoever killed my parents, did it because of what I am?”

 

It is not a thought Peter has considered before, but he has to wonder it now. “It’s possible,” he says. “Not all supernatural creatures get along. There are many of my kind who see others as a threat to their existence.” Peter glances over at her. “Banshees included,” he adds.

 

Lydia takes his answer in stride. She allowed him to flip through her notes for school a week ago to see if there was anything unusual about them. Almost reluctantly, she also let him search her room. Peter made sure to look to Lydia for confirmation before opening anything. She was testy enough about it, and he didn’t want to push her buttons any further.

 

Peter found something in Lydia’s math notes that didn’t look like math. When he showed it to her, Lydia glimpsed over what she had written. Slowly, the look in her eyes became unraveled. Lydia shoved the notebook back at him. _I don’t know what that is_ , she said, her voice shaky. Her eyes didn’t meet his gaze, focusing on the wall instead.

 

“What if they meant to kill me?” Lydia asks next, her voice dropping an octave.

 

It’s yet another thought Peter hasn’t considered before, and it causes his nose and the corners of his mouth to twitch as an anger begins to rise in his chest. The goal could have been to kill a banshee, but they couldn’t have known which member of the family possessed the power. Peter imagines they might have tortured them in search of the answer—or simply sliced up both of them to be on the safe side, but they left a child behind without a second thought.

 

It’s sloppy work, Peter thinks.

 

Or maybe, because of him, Lydia is still alive.

 

Peter retrieved her only a few days after her parents’ deaths. He worked in haste to ensure it. There was a small window, but Lydia was in the care of the state as he was in Oregon. As an Alpha, and with a reputation that precedes him for the brutality in which he murdered the ones responsible for his hospitalization in the first place, leaving the mark of vendetta in his wake, there aren’t many who will stand up to him in his current form—or at least not many who would risk it.

 

Until recently, he didn’t even have a pack. Other concerns could have taken her parents’ killer out of Beacon Hills, though. Peter hasn’t seen him since, so that is entirely plausible. Yet if the target was a banshee and her mother and father were nothing more than human, there could still be a target on her back.

 

And waiting for the right moment is better than fools rushing in.

 

Peter whirls to the nearest window. He rushes to it, looking through the blinds to the street outside. It is evening, the sun just below the horizon and the glow of twilight obscuring his vision. Despite Peter’s heightened eyesight, twilight is the only time of day where a werewolf’s sight is not at its best. It’s the hardest time for his kind to see clearly as the sunlight is fading.

 

Across the street on the neighboring sidewalk, he sees a dark figure in the gleam upon his eyes.

 

Hissing suddenly, Peter draws back from the window. His canines elongate, his eyes glowing a hot, burning red. His claws shoot out of his nail beds at his sides. Peter hears Lydia’s gasp only somewhere marginally in the back of his mind. It’s the last thing on his mind as he turns around quickly, heading for the door.

 

“Peter!” she calls out to him, hurrying to his side. “Peter, where are you—”

 

He whirls on her as her hand touches his arm, growling as he bares his fangs. His face is no longer human, having morphed into its distorted wolfish form. Lydia inhales sharply, her arm darting back to her. She draws away from him. She isn’t afraid of him, but she is afraid. Lydia reeks of it. Her green eyes reflect the light from beyond the window, looking lighter than their normal shade. They seem to glow all on their own, her very own color, like the pale foam on the sea.

 

“Stay in the house,” he orders her, his voice raspier, distorted like his face. “No matter what happens.”

 

Lydia’s eyes widen as he turns away from her. Peter tears open the front door as Lydia yells at him, but her holler is just an echo in the distance like slow motion. Peter doesn’t remember passing over the grass of their lawn or the sidewalk. He stalks onto the street, a sudden clarity to his movement when he feels his boots scuff on the pavement.

 

“So,” cajoles a voice from the murky figure, “you finally decided to step out your front door and see what was right in front of you.”

 

Peter halts in the middle of the road. He breathes hard, trying to focus his eyes. A dark figure, but familiar and outlined in the shadow. A coat, pants; short, shaggy hair, and the glint of light on sunshades. A cane pops out from his side, tapping against the sidewalk.

 

Peter thinks of a million questions, but only one passes his lips. “How long?”

 

The man steps forward, seeming to limp as he leans on his cane, but it’s a farce. Peter knows it. Deucalion knows it. Why he insists on performing it right here in the middle of an empty street for no one else to see but them is beyond Peter. His love of theatrics must be high.

 

“Long enough,” Deucalion admits, limping forward. “I must admit I’ve missed it here in Beacon Hills. I wasn’t able to stay long the first time. Such a terrible waste when things get cut short. Wouldn’t you agree?”

 

Peter flexes his claws, his nose twitching. Were he not an Alpha, he might retreat from a fight with another Alpha.

 

This is territory, though.

 

This is a declaration of war.

 

“Such a shame you came back,” Peter says, and Deucalion smiles at that.

 

Deucalion takes another limp forward, adding extra weight onto his cane. “I beg to differ,” he replies. Slowly, he stands upright again. With the weight lifted from his cane, he appears taller than before. He tilts his head toward the house behind Peter—to Peter’s house. His home with Lydia. “How long,” Deucalion adds, “do you think you can protect her?”

 

Peter roars at him as a bright light enters the left side of his vision, and he whirls toward it. In the middle of the street, he finds himself in the path of a vehicle as a horn honks loudly in the air. Peter darts out of the way, rolling on the pavement, and the car passes him by without incident. He jumps back to his feet, but finds the sidewalk where Deucalion was standing now empty.

 

He looks everywhere, but Deucalion is nowhere in sight.

 

Exhaling harsh breaths, Peter gazes about the block one more time, but the faded haze of twilight hides too much from his sight. Retreating, he hurries back to the house as quickly as his feet will carry him.

 

 


	10. Foolish Denial

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _I’m only now seeing how foolish we’re being._  
> 

_* * *_

 

Peter is nearly asleep when a soft creak at his bedroom door shocks him awake.

 

His eyes shoot open, and he sits upright in alertness. His anxiety is alleviated at the sight of only Lydia in his doorway, though. She freezes halfway into opening the door, noticing his sudden movement, before pushing it open far enough to creep into his room and shut it quietly behind herself.

 

“It’s just me,” Lydia says in a soft voice, crossing the floor in a pair of crew socks and a flannel button-down nightdress. Peter can see that, and he gives her a look, but he doesn’t say anything. She pointedly ignores his look and remains cheerful as she slips into bed beside him, pulling the covers up to her shoulder and lying down with her back to him. “Scott and Erica are still asleep downstairs,” she tells him, and Peter sighs, lying back down. He pulls the covers up to his shoulders as well, and halfheartedly, places an arm around her waist as he settles behind her.

 

Lydia looks over her shoulder, wrinkling her forehead. “What was that for?”

 

Peter eyes her knowingly in the dark. He lifts his eyebrows as he poses his doubt. “And what if they wake up?”

 

She turns around in his grasp to face him, wriggling her head on the pillow until she is comfortable. “They won’t,” she finally says. Lydia gazes at him, then, and her expression is sad. “They’ve been here everyday since, and I haven’t been able to sleep in here because of it. I don’t sleep well without you.” Lydia lowers her eyes, frowning, as she curls one of her legs over his. “I’m used to you.”

 

It’s perhaps the closest admittance of feelings he’s ever heard from her. As much as he wants to tell her to leave so Scott and Erica don’t discover them in bed together, Peter restrains the thought and moves his hand from Lydia’s waist to graze his fingers lightly along her back. Scott and Erica have been here each night since Deucalion’s appearance. Peter knows they need to do something, and they need to do it soon.

 

Fighting is their only option. Running is not even in the question. Deucalion will only follow if he seeks to kill her, and their feet will only take them so far. This is their home, and he would abandon it if it meant she would be safer for it, but as an Alpha, he has to answer a threat with force if he expects to make an example. Running is for betas and omegas, and Peter won’t run now.

 

Lydia tilts her head up to kiss him, and Peter responds at first, raising his hand to her face. His palm hovers above her cheek for a moment before settling down in a gentle motion. Suddenly, he pulls back and shakes his head. “Not tonight,” he tells her.

 

“Not everything is about sex, you know,” Lydia smarts off. “Maybe I just wanted to kiss you.”

 

Peter narrows his eyes at her. “Aren’t you worried?”

 

Lydia pulls back from him in shock. “Of course I’m worried,” she answers. “That doesn’t mean I have to act like it _all_ the time.”

 

“Well, maybe you should.”

 

Lydia sits up in bed, the covers falling off both of them. “I don’t have to act like anything,” she retorts. “I’m tired of being afraid of werewolves. I got enough of that from _you_.”

 

Peter rolls onto his back, sighing as he tips his head into the pillow. He knew this moment would come eventually. It was only a matter of time before Lydia finally addressed it in plain words instead of aggression towards him. He pulls himself up, sitting against the headboard, and runs his hands over his face before turning to her. “Go on,” Peter says, unwilling to interrupt whatever is on Lydia’s mind. If she needs to get it out, then now is the time.

 

“I’ve already been through this before,” Lydia tells him. “I don’t have the energy for it a second time.”

 

Peter feels an anger boiling in his chest as he looks at her. “You’re comparing me to Deucalion now?”

 

“What do you think it feels like,” Lydia answers in a stern voice, narrowing her eyes at him, “to have someone I trusted kiss me before tearing into my side? You don’t think that’s terrifying?”

 

“Trust _ed_?” Peter repeats with an edge to his voice. This conversation is revealing more than he suspected it would. “Are you saying you don’t trust me anymore?”

 

Lydia remains silent at first, though her eyes don’t stray from meeting his gaze. He huffs, tightening his jaw and looking away as he nods his understanding.

 

This is more than he bargained for.

 

Lydia opens her mouth, a sudden exhale filling the silence. “Do you remember,” she says, “the night I ran into the woods?”

 

Peter stubbornly doesn’t answer her, so she continues.

 

“I don’t remember how I got there,” Lydia says, “but when you brought me back . . . I was afraid of you, Peter. I was trying to distract you. I thought I could get you back for what you did to me. That you wouldn’t think I was up to something if things weren’t any different. And you stopped me. I was hurt, and you pushed me away. Do you remember what you said?”

 

Peter remembers the night very clearly, but he still doesn’t say anything. He isn’t even looking at her right now. He isn’t sure he can bear to.

 

“You said,” she whispers even lower, voice trembling, “‘ _Lydia_ _, you’re hurt_.’” Peter finally looks at her out of a compulsion that he can’t control. Silent tears fall from Lydia’s eyes, streaming down her cheeks with soft glints that catch the light in the darkness. “For some reason, you cared that I was hurt. I didn’t understand it. I didn’t understand how you could care after what you did to me, but most of all, I was horrified at myself. For wanting to hurt you. Because that’s not who I am, Peter. I’m not like that.”

 

 _She’s taking a great risk revealing this to me if she doesn’t trust me_ , Peter thinks.

 

It’s the first step of realizing she is telling him the exact opposite.

 

“I thought Jackson,” he says carefully, turning to meet her gaze again, “was your revenge.”

 

Lydia takes a moment to breathe. “I liked Jackson,” she reveals. “Jackson was me moving away from you.”

 

It’s a blow to his gut, even so long after it’s been over.

 

Peter closes his eyes. “I made a mistake.”

 

“I know,” Lydia replies softly. She slides her hand across the sheets. “If I didn’t, I wouldn’t still be here.”

 

“If you left, he’d probably kill you.”

 

Lydia crawls closer to him. She settles in his lap, straddling him and placing her hands on his shoulders. “But you won’t let him,” she says, looking him directly in the eyes. Peter finds himself staring at Lydia, and before he knows it, there is a tightness in his chest and his eyes feel more watery than usual. With a wide gaze, he touches her face. It’s a delicate touch, and using the smallest of headshakes, he answers her without words.

 

Resting her forehead against his, Lydia cups his face back. “That’s why I’m here, Peter,” she tells him. “Because you don’t want anything else to happen to me. Not just because you’ll stop it, but because you don’t want it to happen.” Lydia runs her fingers lightly over his cheek. “And I know that.”

 

Peter lowers his face into the crook of her neck, pulling her closer. He doesn’t say anything else, and neither does Lydia, but she holds him back and lays her hand on the back of his head and strokes his hair.

 

When the position is no longer comfortable, Peter pulls away and draws Lydia to the bed with him. They lie down side by side. This time instead of complaining, he holds her close under the covers with a secure arm around her waist. Her arm loops over his, her hand resting on his hip. They lie together in silence for a long while until Lydia interrupts the quiet.

 

“I read something once,” Lydia says in a low voice, her fingers playing on his hip with a tapping pattern, “about wolves and their social behaviors. Are wolves and werewolves anything alike?”

 

The irony is Peter has never been asked a question like this before. Raised a wolf with other wolves, it was never something that had to be explained to someone. They were careful about their identities. Information like that wasn’t shared with outsiders, and so he doesn’t know where to begin. Peter takes a moment to think about it before he answers her.

 

“There are some similarities,” he answers at last. He begins to rub his hand idly up and down her back. “Why?”

 

“Well, I read that some species of wolves mate for life—life being until the death of their partner—but then in some other species, the alpha male mates within the pack with all fertile females,” Lydia explains, the tapping of her fingers ceasing. “I was wondering which one was more accurate, if either.”

 

His hand stills on her back. He doesn’t have to wonder where the question comes from. Peter curls his tongue between his lips. He considers his words carefully. “Bonds between wolves are stronger than bonds between humans.”

 

“You, Erica, and Scott,” Lydia affirms.

 

Peter looks her in the eyes. “You’re forgetting someone,” he says, tracing a finger along her cheek.

 

“I’m not a wolf.”

 

“But you’re part of the pack,” Peter adds, tilting his head into the pillow. She is a part of the pack, ingrained in it as much as Scott or Erica, or they wouldn’t all be so fussed with protecting her. He regards her in the darkness with curious eyes.

 

“It’s not the same,” Lydia protests quietly.

 

Peter leans in close. “You’re important to me,” he tells her, dismissing her claims, lifting his hand along her arm, running his fingers over her shoulder.

 

“What am I?” she asks, her voice a whisper between them. “To you?”

 

He opens his mouth to answer her until he realizes—his insatiability, his hunger, his immense cravings to possess her, are all warranted under the fact that Peter doesn’t actually know if he _has_ her. Lydia sleeps under this roof, in his bed, in his arms, but his mistake set a rift between them. It sent her into someone else’s arms and made them fight for months. He feels like each action he takes toward her is prefaced with standing before a black chasm in the ground—and he could reach her if he leaps over it violently. All of his anger, all of his rage, all of his obsession is rooted in it, that violent leap to try and reach her.

 

His breath hitches in his throat. He stills, staring at her, and thinks, just maybe, of a different path.

 

“What do you want to be?” Peter asks. In all of his masking of giving her a choice in which he but steers her in his direction, this question is genuine. Lydia averts her eyes, pretending to be uninterested as she purses her lips and shrugs, but he feels her heart beating on her shoulder.

 

“What’s the closest thing a wolf can be?”

 

 _A mate_ , he thinks, but he doesn’t say it out loud. Peter debates it, wondering if he should venture that route of conversation with her. Finally, he says it, anyway.

 

“A mate.”

 

Peter sees the look change in her eyes. Surprise flashes briefly in them as her lips form a little circle, and he thinks maybe if she truly wants to be here, it will calm the rage that boils inside of him. Maybe things will be different if he felt more secure. He doesn’t feel secure. He feels like he could lose her at any moment. He feels like he could turn around and she’d be gone.

 

He feels like all of his possessive behavior, his relentless clawing at her chest to tear through the flesh and retrieve her heart, is all because she hasn’t freely given it to him.

 

“Was Aunt Vivian your mate?” Lydia whispers, her eyes focused on his chest.

 

The name means nothing to him, but it’s an idea. Peter has nearly forgotten it. He began this life by playing a role—pretending to be Lydia’s uncle, mourning the loss of the same family—but now the real him has been set free. Peter forgets the role most days. He is just himself around her now, and that is dangerous.

 

“Yes,” he answers after a moment of silence, “but that was a long time ago.”

 

Truth be told, he’s never had anyone he’s considered a mate. Passing dalliances, mostly. They were never anything serious, and none of them ever lasted long.

 

“What would it be like,” Lydia asks quietly, “being your . . . mate?” It’s a strange word on her tongue, but she tries it out anyway. Lydia is used to modern terms, _human_ terms, and her brow knits together at the thoughts this one evokes in her. “It doesn’t mean . . . _children_ , does it?”

 

Peter wants to laugh. He grins instead. “We’re more human than animal there,” he admits to her, stroking her back with feather light touches.

 

“Is there something you have to do?” she asks. “A practice, or a custom?”

 

“No.”

 

Her eyes lift back to his. “In that case, how do you pick one?”

 

Peter brings his hand to her cheek and runs his thumb over the smooth skin. He stares at Lydia, answering her at last. “You just choose.”

 

Some part of Peter wonders if she finds the whole thing bland and unexciting. “It sounds too easy,” Lydia whispers, and Peter shakes his head.

 

“It’s not.”

 

Peter doesn’t remember the last time he’s had a conversation this calm with her. Lydia looks at him, considering his words, mulling them over in her head as she purses her lips thoughtfully.

 

“Okay,” she finally says.

 

Peter furrows his brow. “Okay what?”

 

“Okay, I’ll be your mate,” Lydia says, looking Peter directly in the eyes.

 

He isn’t expecting his own reaction. Peter stares at her for a long time, his thumb stilling in place on her cheek. When he comes back to himself, he leans in to kiss her once on the mouth, and then he cups her head in his hand and wraps his arm around Lydia, pulling her closer. Peter nuzzles her face, his nose brushing along soft skin, and then his cheek grazes hers as he closes his eyes and pets her hair—it all comes from a very primal place, but rooted in affection, not sexual desire.

 

Peter continues to pet her, running fingertips over her ear, her temple, her cheek as he nudges his nose against her. His lips graze over hers, and they kiss briefly before he’s torn from her once again to find another place to burrow his face. She breathes deep from her lips, tilting her head back to give him access to her neck. He kisses her, nestles against her, brushes his hand over her hair again and again until his frantic movements begin to slow and his eyes close.

 

Peter presses his nose to hers, nudges her, and thinks of her as home.

 

There is a possessive root of _mine_ still somewhere deep within, but on the surface he is calm and none of it shows.

 

He entwines her so close in his limbs that it ought to be uncomfortable for them, but he falls asleep faster than he ever has before, Lydia’s slow breathing against his collarbone, her arms folded between their chests, and her legs looped with his beneath the covers. He subsumes her into himself, lets her take the final ledge he hasn’t given to her yet until she owns it all—every inch of ground he stands on.

 

All she has to do is snap her fingers, and he will heel.

 

-

 

A harrowing scream jolts him awake in the middle of the night.

 

It’s no normal scream. Peter has to wrap his arms around his head, covering his ears as he grimaces and rolls away from it. It seems to go on forever until it stops, and even then, the echo is still painful in the base of his skull. Peter removes his arms in a stunned haze, glancing around the room that seems to move too slow. The speed becomes normal again when his hearing returns slowly but surely, the walls ceasing to spin.

 

Peter rolls over in bed, finding Lydia crouched against the headboard, her knees drawn up to her chest and her elbows pinching them together, hands protecting her ears. He doubts she looked like this a minute ago because she is sobbing, face wrinkled in pain.

 

Peter manages to sit up just in time for Scott to bust headfirst through the door, Erica fast on his heels.

 

Peter looks over at Scott, whose gaze flashes quickly between Lydia and Peter in absolute terror. Peter senses the imminent trouble and stands up, his eyes locked on Scott. Erica steps forward, cutting in front of the younger beta, and throws her arm out to block him from rushing ahead.

 

“Scott,” Erica warns, “it wasn’t Peter.” Erica cuts her head toward Lydia. “Right, Lydia?”

 

Lydia looks up, tears in her eyes. “ . . . What?”

 

“Your _scream_ ,” Erica asserts firmly. “It wasn’t Peter. Right?”

 

Lydia gazes dumbly between Erica and Peter. Peter only takes his eyes off Scott long enough to see Lydia shake her head slowly. “No, it wasn’t Peter,” she says, her gaze returning to Erica. “I don’t . . . I was asleep, and then suddenly . . . ”

 

“Why are you in Peter’s room?” Scott demands, twisting the conversation back onto that. “Why are you in his _bed_ , Lydia?”

 

Lydia is in too much shock to answer him. Instead, she just looks between Peter and Scott, lost and unsure how to respond.

 

“ _Scott_ ,” Erica warns again, pushing at his chest. “This isn’t our business—”

 

Scott shoves her arm away. “Like hell it isn’t!” he yells. “I’m not just gonna stand around while he takes advantage of her!”

 

Peter feels his claws extracting from their nail beds, a red hot fury boiling under the surface as his eyes glow with their alpha tone—blood red and bright. Scott’s always been good at sticking his nose where it doesn’t belong, especially when it comes to Lydia and him. Ever since he found out about their relationship, Scott has been disgusted with it—against it, and violently so. Peter stands alert, ready to spring. Scott’s aggressive behavior is triggering it, and he can’t help but react.

 

There’s too much testosterone for one room.

 

Scott’s claws shoot out from their nail beds, and he bears his fangs at Peter as his eyes glow a golden yellow. Erica panics, but she doesn’t know what to do. Peter is ready to attack when Lydia hurries to the center of the bed, kneeling upright between the two of them with her arms held outward at Scott and Peter. From her position in the middle of the bed, she halts the fight.

 

“Stop this!” Lydia hollers at them both, glancing between Scott and Peter. “This is idiotic! We’re a pack! We’re family! We shouldn’t be fighting within!”

 

“He’s trying—” Scott begins, but Lydia cuts him off.

 

“He isn’t _trying_ anything, Scott,” Lydia snaps. “I let him. Okay? I _let_ him. Now, would you just _stop_ trying to kill each other over me?” Lydia sighs, lowering her arms and slumping as she covers her face with her hands. “God, this is so stupid . . . ”

 

Peter slowly retracts his canines as well as his claws. The boil in his chest reduces to a simmer, only calm because of her request. Scott’s face reads of confusion, but his aggression wanes as well, his natural weapons retreating from sight, the glow fading from his eyes.

 

“He’s your uncle, Lydi—”

 

“He’s _not_ my uncle!” Lydia yells, rounding on Scott. “He married my aunt, and she’s dead. He’s _not_ my dad’s brother, for God’s sake, Scott.”

 

Scott’s expression only wrinkles further in his confusion. “Wait, I thought you were related . . . ”

 

“By marriage,” Peter quips dryly.

 

Scott looks up at him, narrowing his eyes. His expression turns hard again. “It’s still—”

 

“Unnatural?” Lydia cuts in. She makes a circling gesture to include everyone in the room. “You’re all werewolves, Scott. What about _any_ of this is natural?”

 

Scott looks desperately between Lydia and Peter, furrowing his brow as he bites on his bottom lip. He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, clearly caught in a word game he didn’t mean to be a part of. “Look, I don’t know!” Scott finally says, throwing his hands up in the air. He turns away from them, pacing across the floor.

 

“This,” Peter says at last, bringing his voice back to the table, “isn’t good.”

 

“What?” Erica asks, knowing Lydia and Scott are too preoccupied to bother.

 

“We’re fighting within the pack,” Peter explains. “That makes us weak. It makes us vulnerable, and this is probably exactly what they want.”

 

Scott stops pacing. “The people after Lydia?”

 

“Yes,” Peter affirms, locking gazes with Scott. “The people after Lydia. Lydia is what’s important here, Scott, and we both have that same priority. Don’t forget that.”

 

“What made her scream?” Erica asks.

 

Peter turns to Lydia. Erica and Scott do the same. Lydia catches each one of their gazes on her and looks away to close her eyes, taking a deep breath and trying to center herself. She is quiet for a moment, and then suddenly, she shakes her head in response.

 

“I don’t know,” Lydia says. “I don’t know what caused it, and I don’t remember anything. I was just asleep when this . . . this _feeling_ . . . woke me up, and I was screaming. It was like it was beyond my control, and I just . . . ”

 

“I’ve never heard anything like it before,” Peter admits. “Not a scream like that.”

 

“Me either,” Erica agrees, glancing between Peter and Scott. “Or Scott. It woke us up, and we had to cover our ears. We couldn’t _bear_ it. It was like listening to nails on a chalkboard, only amplified.”

 

Peter looks down at Lydia. She is staring off in space as a hollow look settles into her eyes, her lips parting. “I have to go,” she suddenly says, getting up from the bed. Peter reacts quickly, hurrying around the bed after her and grabbing Lydia’s arm.

 

“Wait, Lydia—”

 

“I feel something,” Lydia says, “something isn’t right. I have to go—”

 

Peter loops an arm firmly around her waist, pulling her flush against his chest and backing her away from the door. Lydia struggles against him, getting angry as she pushes at his arm.

 

“Peter, let me _go_ —”

 

“It’s a trap,” he whispers in her ear. Lydia stills, listening to him. “It’s a trap.”

 

“What are you talking about?” she whispers.

 

“Your powers,” Peter adds in a single breath, finally realizing they can’t deny it any longer. “They are using your powers to draw you out of the house. You’re a banshee, Lydia. You can sense when someone is about to die. This is how it starts—with screams. They drown out the noise, letting you focus.” Peter loosens his arm on her, but he doesn’t let her go. “All this means,” he adds, “is that they just killed someone to get to you.”

 

“If they just killed someone, then we have to do _something_ —”

 

“There’s nothing we can do,” Peter says against her ear, shaking his head. “They are already dead.” He glides his hand over her hair in soothing strokes and leans his face into it. “We’ll wait ‘til morning, and then we’ll go. In the daylight, when it’s safer.”

 

“But I _feel_ it,” Lydia whispers. “I know where to go . . . ”

 

He continues brushing his hand over her hair until her nerves have calmed down and he feels her slacken in his embrace. Peter can only imagine what might have happened to Lydia were he not here with her. If she had woken up in the middle of the night, screaming, and followed the little _push_ inside of her brain that told her where to go.

 

“Not now, sweetheart,” Peter murmurs, kissing her hair. He buries his nose into hair, pressing against her, closing his eyes. “Not now.”

 

 


	11. Red Flags

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _I’m meant to fight this war without weapons._  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are about at the three-quarters mark for this story, so it's not quite at its end, but it's getting towards it. Anyway, I also wanted to take a moment to thank everyone for reading and reviewing, and maybe we won't have but a few more chapters to go before it reaches its end.

_* * *_

 

Despite the desecration below, the vantage point of the cliff is a beautiful sight by comparison. Wild flowers bloom amongst the weeds running rampant, the brush growing tall enough to shield them from the eyes in the hollow at the base of the cliff on the edge of the forest. The ground is teeming with law enforcement and a coroner, investigating the scene.

 

It is a pertinent spot to examine the crime for Erica, Scott, and him. Their vision is potent enough to see everything in the distance, while Lydia can only make out small blurs dotted against the skyline. She has nothing to go on but their relays of information to her, her face screwed up in displeasure at having to rely on the three of them for this, too.

 

The body is torn to shreds much like the ghost of a memory. Peter closes his eyes and sees the whirling autumn leaves and spilled pearls picking out pinpricks of faint light. He listens to the wind for brief moment until a voice breaks him from reverie.

 

“Is he just gonna keep doing this?” Scott asks, speaking up. “Killing people if we don’t hand her over?”

 

Peter opens his eyes. “Yes.”

 

Scott looks off, glaring into the sunset, but it’s not the sun causing the sour look on his face. “Then we have to do something,” he says. He balls his fists up at his sides. “Before he kills anyone else.”

 

“He has Alphas,” Peter responds.

 

That comment garners him looks from all three of them, but Erica and Scott most of all. Lydia already knew. He’s told her as much.

 

“I thought _he_ was an Alpha,” Erica states, not quite grasping how the puzzle fits.

 

“They’re all Alphas,” Peter comments casually, turning away from the carnage at last, curling his fingers into his palms. “All three of them.”

 

“ _All_ of them?” Erica asks, horror in her voice laced with disbelief. “We can barely fight you, and it takes two of us just to do that. Exactly how are we supposed to fight _three_ Alphas?”

 

Peter turns around. “Why do you think we haven’t yet?” he asks, tilting his head, eyes narrowed. He waits for an answer in the silence, but neither beta gives. “It’s going to take more than just sharp claws and werewolf strength to win this one. It’s going to take wits. _Planning_. Deucalion is playing a game with us. Otherwise, he would’ve used brute force from the beginning. He’s a wolf who likes a chase. He isn’t going to come head on unless it’s his last option available. There’s only three of them right now, but I bet he’s looking for more. We do have to finish this sooner rather than later, but let’s not be hasty.”

 

“How are there three Alphas in a pack?” Scott inquires next, the question made up of pure curiosity. “Why would two Alphas even bother taking orders from him if they’re just as powerful?”

 

“They’re not,” Peter replies, looking at Scott. “They’re nowhere near Deucalion’s level. But they are stronger than you, and he is their Alpha, even though they’re Alphas in their own right.”

 

“He isn’t gonna rest until she’s dead, is he?” This time it’s Erica, her voice solemn and her gaze cast over the edge of the cliff. Officials below snap more pictures of the dead body with little yellow square markers, each numbered, placed in neat positions around it.

 

Peter has only heard so many stories, but none of them have a silver lining.

 

“I don’t think he’ll rest even then,” Peter finally says, turning away from the cliff side and taking Lydia by the waist as he passes her. It’s habit to keep her close to him, to keep her safe. He waits for his betas to follow, knowing they won’t be far behind.

 

-

 

“Why does he want me dead?” Lydia asks, and it’s only the hundredth time she has asked it. Peter thinks he ought to mind by now, or at least sigh exasperatedly at hearing it again, but he only gulps, throat bobbing at an unfamiliar tightness.

 

Peter glances over at her. Lydia is seated next to him on the couch, head tipped forward as she gazes at the archaic language in the book laid across her lap. Peter thinks gazing because she’s not really reading it anymore, she’s just staring at it, sliding her finger over the pages with glassy eyes.

 

He’s slouched beside her, so he tilts toward her, his head just a fraction shorter than hers as he leans in close. Peter places his palm underneath the cover of the book and gently pushes upward to shut it. Lydia picks up what he’s doing and moves her hand, letting him close it. He takes the book from her lap and sets it aside.

 

“Why does he want an Alpha pack?” Peter offers. He shrugs. “Power.”

 

“How will killing _me_ give him power?”

 

Peter blinks, considering his answer. He reaches for her chin, gliding the back of his fingers against it. “You’re capable of very extraordinary and very detrimental things, Lydia. Banshees are rare, and there’s not a lot of lore on them. The extent of their powers is a mystery, even to most textbooks of old.” Peter turns her chin toward him, bringing her gaze to his. “You might have powers that he fears—or covets and can’t have. Or maybe he thinks he _can_ have them, and he’s been looking for a way all this time to steal them.” His eyes narrow, a new thought he didn’t have before springing into existence.

 

“What is it?” Lydia asks, reading the look on his face.

 

Peter lowers his hand from her chin. “Maybe he killed your parents with the full knowledge that neither one of them were banshees . . . ” His eyes scan her whole face. “Maybe he thought the grief would kick start your powers, but it didn’t. And his plan failed.”

 

Her lip trembles. “I didn’t have time to grieve,” she says, nearly a whisper. Lydia wipes her cheek as a tear spills from her eye. “I mean, I did, but I didn’t _drown_ in it. I would’ve—if they put me in a foster home, but I had you.” Peter expects her eyes to falter as she gazes at him, but they don’t. Lydia shakes her head. “I didn’t feel alone. You were always there. To comfort me, hold me. Remind me I wasn’t on my own. It wasn’t until—”

 

She looks away finally, casting her face to the left to stare at the back of the couch instead of him.

 

Peter senses it instantly. “I bit you,” he finishes for her, understanding at last. It wasn’t his bite that brought out her powers.

 

It was her grief, her fear, and the idea of her last safe haven—gone overnight.

 

It changes everything.

 

Peter glances away. The television is off, the black screen reflecting their visages back to him. It’s nighttime, so the room is dark, but it’s well lit enough that Lydia insisted on reading without the lamp. The light from the windows casts a glow behind them, but leaves them in a dark silhouette.

 

If he wanted to kill her, Deucalion could have broken into the house. It wouldn’t have been too hard to do that. Peter may doubt Deucalion’s resolve at defeating him, but Deucalion still has an edge with two Alphas on his side. Maybe he can’t be bothered to attract too much attention to himself with a big showdown in this quiet suburb. The police would come any moment to a noise complaint or fear of worse than that.

 

But if he wants her alive, well, that makes more sense in retrospect.

 

Attempting to lure Lydia out without any bloodshed sheds a new light on recent events. Deucalion wants to capture her without much of a fight. He doesn’t want to kill her.

 

He just wants her.

 

Lydia crawls into his lap suddenly, snapping Peter from his thoughts. He holds his hands out as she settles comfortably into place, wrapping an arm around his neck and laying her head upon his shoulder. She runs her hand down the back of his head, fingers sliding over his hair until they reach his neck. “You’ve got that look on your face,” Lydia murmurs into his neck.

 

“What look?”

 

“Guilt,” she whispers.

 

Peter sighs softly through his nose, letting his hands lay on her back. He hadn’t been channeling guilt, but if that’s what she saw, he’d rather not steer her back to Deucalion right now. He rubs her back soothingly, hoping it takes her mind off of these things.

 

“I’d feel better,” he says, “if you couldn’t go anywhere at night.”

 

Lydia pulls back from him, both of her hands resting on his shoulders. She gives him a bewildered look.

 

“What do you mean?” she asks.

 

-

 

The cuffs don’t exactly seem to hurt her, the metal covered with a soft pink fuzz that reminds Peter distinctly of down feathers, but she still shifts uncomfortably against them on the bed. “How am I supposed to _sleep_ like this?”

 

“I can give you something to help you sleep,” Peter offers, but Lydia only sighs deeply.

 

“Fine,” she says. “I’ll take it.”

 

She sounds dejected, unhappy with being handcuffed to the headboard. Since it isn’t under the circumstances that the handcuffs were originally marketed for, he can almost understand her frustration—but it’s for her own good. It’ll protect her if Deucalion makes another kill, siphoning her powers through the pull of death to draw Lydia to him.

 

Peter returns with a glass of water and a pill. He helps her to scoot a little higher on the bed, supports her head with his hand, and tilts the glass against her lips after he has given her the pill. She lies back down afterwards, sighing again, and shuts her eyes. As he places the glass on the end table, Lydia opens her eyes once more and looks up at him.

 

“Tell me a story,” she asks softly, already looking and sounding drowsy, her eyes unfocused. It’s a strong sleeping aid. Peter is sure it’s started to work.

 

Maybe it’s strong enough to prevent a call from death reaching her, too.

 

He didn’t get her young enough to have ever told her bedtime stories, but Peter wonders if it wasn’t just something Lydia’s father used to do for her when she was young and maybe the memory of it is soothing, so he sits beside her with a pillow wedged between his back and the headboard and strokes her forehead as he tells Lydia a tale that was once told to him as a child.

 

It’s an old tale, folklore passed down through his family, and there may be a ring of truth to it, but he’s never found out just how much.

 

Lydia falls asleep to the sound of his voice, measured breathing leveling out to a soft exhale at his side.

 

Peter looks down at her and considers going back to his bed, but he can’t. He lies next to her but keeps his arm to himself, and falls asleep beside Lydia as the last thoughts of _den_ and _safe_ run through his head.

 

-

 

The peace doesn’t last for long, her harrowing scream awakening him once again in the middle of the night.

 

He makes it out with nothing more than a lingering earache, though tears stream down Lydia’s face in the aftermath. He scrabbles for the keys, unlocks her wrists from the cuffs, and draws Lydia into his arms. She’s stiff and still in his embrace, and Peter doesn’t know if werewolf capabilities can pull out the internal pain left behind by a banshee’s scream, but he tries it anyway.

 

When Lydia falls limp against him, Peter knows it worked, and his hand cradles the back of her head near his own.

 

He doesn’t know what else to do, so he just stays there with her and holds Lydia as he strokes his hand soothingly over her hair, and he whispers _shh, it’s all right_ over and over again into her ear until he hopes she believes it.

 

It isn’t true, but she believes it as she always has.

 

Her arms wrap loosely about his neck, and when the urge to follow the little _push_ in her head comes to her, Lydia clutches him harder and sobs quietly against his chest as his arms tighten around her, too.

 

-

 

Downstairs, Peter finds a stone thrown through one of the windows, breaking a single panel of glass.

 

It’s shattered across the floor, glistening shards that would have blended into the carpet had they not caught the light. Peter bends over and picks up the stone, a smooth black oblong. On the underside there is a marking carved into it. An old rune. It stands for doom, fate—inexorable, inescapable.

 

Peter resists the urge to throw it back out the window, knowing that it’ll just end up back in his house again if he does. Instead, he grips it and carries it upstairs to his room and puts it away in a dresser drawer so he doesn’t have to look at it. He doesn’t want to think about it for now, and Lydia is finally asleep again.

 

He checks on her in intervals throughout the night.

 

When she wakes in the morning, he will likely be fast asleep at her feet.

 

-

 

Peter wakes up to Lydia’s fingers grazing behind his ear. His eyelids flutter open but fall closed again, and he nudges into her touch.

 

“You sleep like a puppy,” Lydia says. “Did you know that?”

 

Opening his eyes just slightly, he offers her the smallest of glares.

 

Her tone becomes serious. “Did you stay up all night?”

 

Peter closes his eyes. He nods an inch.

 

Her hand smoothes over his hair. It has grown out some. He hasn’t cut it lately. It sticks up when it’s messy, like now, but he can’t be bothered to care. There have been other things far more important, grooming taking a backseat in the present. He still shaves, but that’s about it.

 

“Get some rest,” she whispers, and he feels the ghost of her lips on his forehead. Peter feels her get up from the bed and leave, but he never hears the door behind her.

 

He is already out.

 

-

 

He sits in the living room on the couch, holding the stone oblong in his hand as he turns it over and over. The glass has been long since cleaned up. Scott offered to help clean it up, his usual antagonism towards Peter turning into a budding will to help Lydia instead. They have a mutual interest in her, something Scott is learning to see. He may not approve of their relationship or the consequences of it, but his approach has turned into non-interference.

 

Peter reinstalled a new window panel himself, fixing the hole in a day. He called Erica on Lydia’s phone, asked her to attach herself to Lydia whenever she could, keep an eye on her, come over often and spend time with her. He doesn’t think about the former fallout anymore. The pack is changing, altering its ways. What begun as budding self-interest became friendship for them.

 

Scott can’t spend everyday here, though. His mother has become worried about him as of late, coming by and inquiring about him, so Peter told him to go home and spend some time with her. Erica has encountered the same reaction from her parents, though she says they normally don’t give a damn what she does, so she is making the effort for the next few days to reinforce their old behavior again by pretending to be her old self and holing herself up in her room like she used to do.

 

The house is quiet, but not empty. Lydia is upstairs doing her homework. Peter leaves her alone to let her actually study and focuses all of his energy on the rock in his hand.

 

He’s still mad at it. He wants to chuck it out. What he doesn’t want to do is break another window, so he resists the urge, even though the sound of smashing glass might satisfy the seething rage inside him.

 

He’s so lost in his thoughts that he doesn’t hear Lydia come down the stairs.

 

He’s turning over the stone in his hand when Lydia crawls into his lap and seats herself above him. She runs her hand over the side of his face and down his neck, scooting close to him by rocking her hips. “You’re worrying too much,” she says, her fingertips at the nape of his neck when he realizes her breasts are in his full view, his face tipped low. He’s staring, and Lydia notices, so she arches her back to give him a better view.

 

He drops the stone, clattering it to the floor, and wraps his hands gently around her waist. “I have to,” he says into her chest, neck tingling as her nails scrape in a downward path between his shoulder blades and over his shirt. “I have to think. I have to figure this out.” Peter didn’t anticipate Deucalion using her like this, hurting her over and over, dropping bodies to sound off paranormal beacons for Lydia’s ears only in his attempts to drag her away.

 

“You’ll figure this out,” Lydia whispers, taking his earlobe between her teeth and worrying it gently. She sucks, nice and slow, and then licks her way up the shell of his ear, palming him through his jeans, and Peter wonders when the roles got reversed—she’s in his position now, and he’s in hers—and as her fingers deftly tug on his belt, he thinks he doesn’t mind as much as he should.

 

She gets his pants undone, his hand coaxing over her hair, and pulls his cock free from his jeans. Easing herself out of his lap, Lydia casts her eyes up at him as she settles between his knees and takes him into her mouth to suck him off. She looks upward at him, keeps her eyes on him, and she’s slow with it. His head falls back against the couch, eyes closing, as he feels her lips glide back and forth, the heat of her mouth surrounding him. Peter enjoys the pace of it and rests his hand on her hair, but he doesn’t push her or guide her. He caresses the loose tresses until she pulls off of him, her tongue ghosting over the tip.

 

He opens his eyes and looks down at her. Lydia’s gaze is still focused on his face as she strokes his cock and sinks her mouth back down on it, blood red lipstick smeared all over his shaft but more prominent at the base. Her other hand isn’t in sight, but he sees Lydia rock forward, other arm in front of her, hand hidden beneath her skirt. She takes him in as far as she can go and pulls back when she needs to breathe, returning only to suck on the head with languorous strokes of her tongue.

 

She stands up, tugging his pants and briefs down to his ankles, and crawls back into his lap to straddle him. Lydia catches his lips with a full-on kiss, wrapping her arm firmly around his shoulders as she grinds down. Teeth scrape along his bottom lip, her hand dragging upward through his hair. He probably looks like a mess, hair sticking up, lipstick smeared on his face, but Peter doesn’t care.

 

When she raises herself up, he helps guide his cock to her entrance. Lydia does the rest, sitting down on him until he’s engulfed in the heat between her legs, her fingers grasping hard in his hair. She moans, a sound both soft and broken to his ears.

 

Lydia sets the pace of this, too. She fucks him slowly, rocking back and forth and running her nails against his scalp, distracting him with kisses. He loses himself in them, in the feel of her mouth, in the tight slide of her along his cock. When he knows he’s about to come, he pulls out and spends himself on her thigh instead, their lips still attached—a soft sound in the back of her throat in union with his deeper groan.

 

He falls still, but Lydia takes his dick into her hand and lazily strokes her fingers over him, scrapes her thumb across the oversensitive tip of his slit. His hips jerk back, and Lydia smiles hazily into his hiss of pain. She removes her hand, lifting it to her mouth. Her tongue darts out to lick her fingers clean and suck on them, getting all of the come and smiling again at the look on his face as he watches her with lips parted, breath slow.

 

Peter bears her from his lap to the couch, laying her down and hoisting her knees up to her chest. He buries his face against her cunt, licking her slit, and ghosts his hand over her thigh. Lydia trembles and runs her hand over his hair, gasping at the slide of his tongue and moaning pleasurably when he slips his fingers inside of her. It isn’t until she spreads her legs further that she _oohs_ , shocks causing her to tremble more. Peter works at it until he feels her come for him, shuddering all around his face and fingers, and he licks that up, too.

 

She slumps against the couch, breathing heavily, all of her clothes still on her but her panties. Even her stockings remain, hiked high above her knees. Peter slides his hand over her leg, trailing along the thin fabric, and kisses her oversensitive clit. She moans instead of admonishing him and reaches out. He crawls up to her and kisses her, losing their tongues in each other’s mouths.

 

The doorbell rings, high and loud throughout the foyer.

 

Peter opens his eyes and looks sideways, the couch blocking his view of the door. “Ignore it,” Lydia whispers, and she pulls him back down to her mouth. They are ravenous kisses that says she wants more, but the doorbell rings again. Twice this time, the person on the other side more insistent for an answer. Peter pulls away from her lips.

 

“I should answer that,” he says.

 

Lydia sighs, turning her head away from him. She isn’t happy about it. “Okay, but come back,” she whines, facing him again and dragging her fingers along the curve of his jaw. Her mouth is smeared with ruined lipstick as well. Peter kisses her anyway, beyond caring. She’s just as beautiful this way, too.

 

He gets up from the couch, tucking himself back into his pants and fastening his belt. He runs a hand over his hair, though it doesn’t do much to smooth any of it down, and approaches the door. It rings a third time, twice in a row again, which is followed with a bang of a fist against the wood. “Mr. Wagner, are you home?” calls an anxious voice through the den.

 

Sheriff Stilinski.

 

Peter’s senses are set off by the sound of the sheriff’s voice. _What is he doing here?_ He hurries the rest of the way and opens the door, greeted with the steely gaze of the sheriff, which turns wide-eyed at the sight before him.

 

Sheriff Stilinski gives him a once over. “Wild night?” he asks.

 

Peter glances down at himself. His button-up shirt is askew, not quite sitting on his shoulders right, and only half tucked into his pants. At least his pants are up all the way, Peter muses, meeting the sheriff’s gaze again without shame.

 

“Something like that,” Peter answers.

 

Stilinski stares at Peter’s face. He lifts his own hand, gesturing around his mouth. “You’ve got—”

 

“Oh,” Peter says. “Right.” He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “Look, I don’t mean to be rude, Sheriff, but can we get this over with quick?”

 

Stilinski purses his lips and gives a perfunctory nod. “Right,” he echoes. Stilinski clears his throat and looks away before turning back to Peter, hands on his duty belt. “Mr. Wagner, are you aware you had someone watching your house just a few minutes ago? My son’s best friend, Scott, he’s friends with your niece, Lydia, and he said you’ve been having some strange, um, visitors lately. Trying to break in. Intimidate you and Lydia. He asked me if I would check out things for you, so I decided to swing by tonight and I saw someone—”

 

The sheriff turns around and points at the hedges across the road a few houses down.

 

“—Watching your house from right over there. I made myself known to him—or her—and the perp fled. Took off towards the end of the road and cut a corner. I tried to chase him down, but I lost him—”

 

Sheriff Stilinski turns back to Peter and pauses, his eyes catching a sight beyond Peter’s shoulder. “Good evening, Lydia,” he says with a smile, but then his face switches from a smile to concern in less than two seconds. “Are you all right?”

 

Peter turns around in time to see Lydia, who had apparently been trying to creep by them, freeze at the sound of the sheriff’s greeting. She turns toward them, her hand still covering her lower face. “I’m fine, thank you,” she mumbles quickly.

 

“I’m sorry, I couldn’t—”

 

Lydia drops her hand. “I’m fine, thank you,” she says, louder this time.

 

Peter looks back to Sheriff Stilinski, who has frozen in front of the doorway, his face losing all expression except what appears to be sheer dumbfounded shock. The sheriff returns his gaze to Peter, his eyes lowering slowly to Peter’s mouth.

 

The smeared lipstick on his face.

 

The same shade of smeared lipstick on Lydia’s face.

 

His whole core tenses up as he notices the sheriff’s face grow taut. The other man draws his gun, and Peter takes a step back, raising his hands. If there’s one thing werewolves can’t rejuvenate from, it’s bullet wounds to the head. The sheriff has it pointed at Peter’s skull in a manner of two seconds.

 

The barrel trembles.

 

“ _Peter!_ ” Lydia yells, running to them. She reaches his side, touching Peter’s arm and moving herself close. “Please, Sheriff, put down the gun—”

 

“Yes,” Peter echoes, his voice rigid. “Please, Sheriff. I’m unarmed.”

 

Stilinski’s face grows more angered by the moment. “You sick son-of-a- _bitch_ —”

 

“ _I_ kissed him!” Lydia defends, her shrill voice rising. “ _Please_ , Sheriff Stilinski, this is a mistake—”

 

“You’re _damned_ right this is a mistake—”

 

“Really, don’t you think you’re overreacti—”

 

The sheriff glares fiercely at Peter. “This is hardly an _overreaction_ , Peter,” Stilinski says, cutting him off.

 

“Please, Sheriff—” Lydia pleads.

 

Peter can’t stop himself. The gun is already drawn, and he tips the scales further, horrifying Lydia into silence. “You just wish _you_ could do it,” Peter goads. “Bury yourself in that tight, little—”

 

Stilinski grits his teeth.

 

The gun goes off, and Lydia screams—louder than the bullet exiting the chamber and louder than anything else around them.

 

“ _Peter!_ ”

 

 


	12. Out of the Dark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _One more “no,” and I’ll believe you._  
> 

_* * *_

 

As the bullet grazes by his ear, Peter snatches Stilinski’s wrist and twists the gun out of his hand. He knew the pull was coming before it happened, and dodged to the right to avoid the gunfire before it came. It draws blood as it rips past his ear, and the gun goes off a second time in the struggle, bullet striking the wall—Peter hears the split of wood—but Lydia screams again, not knowing where it struck.

 

The gun drops as Stilinski lets out a howl of pain. Peter kicks it. It skids down the hallway, and Peter trips Stilinski, dropping him to the floor. He is on top of him before the other man can react, his clasp still tight on the sheriff’s wrist. Red fills his vision as his eyes begin to glow, and he bares his canines in a fearsome growl. Peter raises his hand up and extends his claws, intent to kill in his eyes.

 

“Peter, _no_!”

 

He halts, chest heaving as he breathes in deeply. In most situations he would kill before complications could arise, but her command stops him in his tracks.

 

The sheriff’s eyes are wide with fear as he stares up at Peter. Time seems to slow down, though the ground feels unsteady beneath him. Peter is half-transformed, crouched above Stilinski, an inhuman visage ready to rip out his throat. Stilinski is not going to forget this. It will be branded into his memory for the rest of his life, however long or short that is.

 

“Peter, please don’t kill him,” Lydia pleads. She sounds on the verge of tears as she begs for the man beneath him. “ _Please_.”

 

Peter glances over at her. He doesn’t relinquish his hold on Stilinski, but he does shift his hand from the man’s wrist to his jacket, gripping fast.

 

“What am I supposed to do, Lydia?” he asks with a patronizing tone, voice made deeper by the newly elongated canines in his mouth. “He’s the sheriff. If I let him go, what do you think he’ll do?”

 

Lydia stares back, her eyes full of hopelessness. “He has a son,” she whispers.

 

Peter knows what she wants him to do. He looks back down at the sheriff, who is still fixated in horror on his distorted features. Lydia wants to save the man, but there isn’t a choice.

 

Peter curls his claws through the air before lowering them to the sheriff’s face.

 

“More police will be on their way, Peter,” Lydia tries harder, causing him to halt again. “Someone heard those gunshots, and more will be coming. If you kill him, they’ll catch you. You can’t do this—”

 

He whirls on her. “Do you _want_ to be taken away?” he growls.

 

Lydia is floored by his reaction. She blinks once, her bright eyes glistening with unshed tears. “I can’t choose murder over that,” she answers quietly, shaking her head at him. “I can’t . . . ”

 

“The girl’s right,” Stilinski says warily beneath him, daring to speak. “It won’t be worth it, Peter—”

 

With a strong grip on the collar of Stilinski’s jacket, Peter shoves him back into the ground. “Don’t tell me what’s _worth_ it,” he hisses.

 

“ _Peter_ —”

 

“I can dispose of the body, Lydia,” Peter assures her calmly, tracing a claw along the sheriff’s cheek. “If I do it now, I’ll have the time.”

 

“ _No_ ,” she demands.

 

For once, her voice doesn’t waver.

 

Peter weighs his options. There aren’t many, but one comes to mind. He’s never done it before. It’ll be his first time, and it may be executed imperfectly, but it is his only option if she won’t let him kill Stilinski. “Fine,” Peter bites back, his eyes never leaving the sheriff. “Go upstairs. Bring me a wet washcloth. A fresh shirt. Clean yourself up and change.” He cocks his head to the side in a predatory manner, eyeing the sheriff distastefully. “They’ll be here any minute.”

 

“You won’t kill him?” Lydia asks in disbelief.

 

“No,” Peter says, turning to look at her. “Now, _go_!”

 

Lydia turns away and hurries upstairs. She comes back with the fresh t-shirt and washcloth as he asked, and Peter doesn’t bother climbing off the sheriff to wipe his face down with the cloth, removing the traces of lipstick from his skin, and tears off his shirt to replace it with the new one quickly, handing both items back to Lydia.

 

“Now, go get cleaned up,” Peter tells her, his eyes still on Stilinski. As she leaves the second time, the sheriff gazes out of the corner of his eye long enough to see Lydia disappear up the stairs. When he looks back to Peter, panic sets in his eyes. Peter only smiles down at him.

 

“You’re . . . you’re not human,” Stilinski manages to say.

 

The shock must have worn off him. Peter raises his eyebrows. “No,” he answers. He leans in closer. “No, I’m not.”

 

“What do you plan on doing?” Stilinski asks, an edge to his voice.

 

Peter stares at him for a moment. He wants to play with him, but there’s no time. The authorities will be here any minute. Two gunshots, and someone was bound to have heard them. “You’re going to forget all about this.”

 

Stilinski blinks at him. He narrows his eyes. “What do you mean?”

 

Peter leans down until he is just a few inches from Stilinski’s face. The other man turns his head away from him, reviled by the closeness, but his eyes are stuck on Peter. With one hand tight on the collar of Stilinski’s jacket, Peter runs the other over the sheriff’s hair in a mock loving gesture until his hand is cupping the back of Stilinski’s head. “I won’t kill you,” Peter informs him in a low voice, “because you won’t remember any of this.”

 

Stilinski still looks distrustful as well as revolted, but he keeps his voice even. “If I forget about this . . . then you won’t kill me?”

 

Peter grins. “That’s cute,” he says. “You think this is an agreement.”

 

Claws out against the sheriff’s neck, Peter drives them into the man’s flesh at the top of the spine. Stilinski gasps like he can’t breathe, arching up and struggling. Peter holds fast and draws all recent memory out of the man. It’s imperfect, but it’s only a few minutes. He doesn’t know how to pick and choose, so he can only take all of it. _Temporary amnesia_ , they’ll call it. Peter isn’t sure when to stop.

 

Perhaps he goes farther than he means to, so when he stops, he’s hissing and the sheriff is gasping for air. Peter rolls off of him, clutching his hand, his claws still extended. It hurts. It _burns_ right down to the nerve endings. His hand shakes. He didn’t know it would feel like this. Talia never taught him anything about how to take a memory. It’s only the ability of an Alpha. Betas can’t do it. Peter has never done it before. He’s only heard stories. Only read about it.

 

It _burns_.

 

When Lydia comes rushing back down the stairs in clean night clothes, she finds both of them on the floor, clutching onto themselves for different reasons. Lydia hesitates on who to check first, but she rushes to Peter’s side in the aftermath and crouches beside him.

 

“What happened?” she asks in a rough whisper, looking over her shoulder at the sheriff.

 

Peter glances over at him. Stilinski has rolled onto his stomach, dry heaving. He’s crawling across the floor. Towards his gun. Peter panics. If it didn’t work—

 

He pushes himself up, Lydia helping him, his hand still grasping his other wrist with a knuckle white fist. The sheriff collapses back to the ground. “What the . . . ” Stilinski gasps. “What the . . . hell . . . _happened_ . . . ” A wheeze fills the air.

 

Peter’s chest suddenly relaxes. It worked. He looks down at his hand, forcing his claws to retract with a hiss. They feel like knives reentering his nail beds. “There was a struggle,” he calls out, creating a false story for the sheriff to believe. “The man shoved you into a wall. You hit your head. Dropped your gun. I grabbed it. I shot at him once, but I missed. He ran off.”

 

When Peter looks at Lydia, he sees her staring in horror at Stilinski. Her lips are trembling, but she closes them and turns away.

 

Peter hears the sirens in the distance down the road before either one of them.

 

The next hour and a half is a haze of answering the same questions over and over to different people. Stilinski’s memory goes back no further than seeing the perp across the road, watching their house, which is almost too perfect even though it was an accident. The officials all assume it was the same person, and Lydia finds herself absolved of any involvement; her story is that she was upstairs when it all happened and she was too afraid to come down until everything was quiet and she heard Peter call out for her.

 

There are two impact sites on the walls. The first one Peter claims was Stilinski. The second one he claims for himself. They don’t charge him with anything for snatching the sheriff’s gun and opening fire, and Stilinski, though confused over his short-term memory loss for the night, thanks Peter with a pat on the back for defending him after the gun was knocked out of his hands.

 

When everything is done and everyone is gone and all of the pictures are taken, Peter shuts the door behind the last person with a gratefulness he didn’t know he was capable of possessing. He closes his eyes, exhales a deep breath, and presses his forehead against it.

 

The peaceful reprieve is broken when Lydia speaks up from somewhere behind him with an uncharacteristically quiet tone; her voice cuts through his mind like a whetted knife.

 

“What did you do to him?”

 

Peter reopens his eyes.

 

Pushing away from the door, he turns to face her. His answer, a lie, comes more easily than usual. “I hit him upside the head,” Peter says, brushing past her. “A little too hard.” He doesn’t like lying to her as much anymore, the fallout over his secrets kept from her fresh in his memory, but he does it anyway, never looking Lydia in the eye as they cross paths.

 

He hears her fists curl into little balls once he is past her, soft knuckles cracking. “You know,” Lydia tells him, “concussions only work like that in the movies.”

 

Peter pauses. He forgets sometimes that Lydia is a science and a math major. He forgets, on occasion, how much she knows about human anatomy in comparison to him. It’s a slip of the mind, and he sighs, already knowing he has lost this one. And yet he’d rather she be mad at him for withholding a truth than know what he is capable of and worry, or wonder, if he has ever used it on her.

 

He walks away without answering her, knowing full well he will pay for it later.

 

-

 

Scott runs over to their house the next day, as evidenced by his heavy breathing when Peter opens the door, his expression confounded at the sight of Peter. The look takes Peter off guard. This is his house. Who else did Scott expect to see? A second later, Scott is catching his breath before he tries to speak. He ran far, even for a werewolf.

 

“Is Lydia home?” Scott finally asks, still heaving in breaths.

 

“Yes,” Peter answers. He juts his thumb over his shoulder towards the kitchen. “She’s in there.” His brow furrows as a thought hits. Scott looks like something is troubling him. “Is something wrong?”

 

“I heard about last night from Stiles,” Scott says.

 

 _Ah, Stiles_ , Peter thinks. _The best friend_.

 

“Sheriff Stilinski,” Scott continues, “is Stiles’s dad. I just wanted to come over to make sure everything was okay. He said Lydia was really shaken up.”

 

Peter feels his lips want to tighten up with a mild frustration. He recalls now the likely reason why Lydia didn’t want Stilinski to be killed. As the father of Scott’s best friend, it would only come back to bite him through Scott. He would ask too many questions. Wonder about too many things. Peter is sure she didn’t want an innocent man dying either, but Scott’s involvement with the sheriff’s son is just the beginning of a long list of complications.

 

“It was a trying night,” Peter finally says. “For everyone.”

 

“The sheriff’s doing fine,” Scott tells him with a smile on his face. It falls a second later. “But why doesn’t he remember anything? He doesn’t even recall knocking on the front door.”

 

“He hit his head,” Peter answers slowly, “when he was thrown against a wall by a werewolf nearly twice his size. It can do that to you, Scott.”

 

“Deucalion’s man?”

 

“Yes,” Peter lies effortlessly. Lying to Scott is too easy. He doesn’t falter or pause like he does with Lydia. “I took his gun when it flung from his hands and tried to fire myself, but the other werewolf took off and ran.”

 

Scott narrows his eyes. “Why would he run from a gun if there’s no silver bullets in it?”

 

Peter is feeling his patience leave him. “You know, a real bullet right to the head can kill us, too, Scott.”

 

Scott is quiet for a beat. “Why didn’t you kill him?”

 

“Do I _look_ like I carry a gun?” Peter snaps. “I don’t _use_ guns. I’m not going to be a perfect aim pulling a trigger when I’m used to good old fashioned claws.”

 

The two of them stare each other down in the doorway with Scott’s glare looking more and more like that of a petulant child to Peter until Lydia leaves the kitchen and comes by, interrupting the uncomfortable silence between them. Lydia looks from Scott to Peter, tilting her chin up. Peter feels her hand, small and soft, on his back.

 

“Is everything all right?” she asks, and Peter feels himself instantly relax and sees Scott’s shoulders slump under her inquiry.

 

“Yeah,” they both answer her at once. Lydia perks up her eyebrows.

 

“Scott,” she finally says, turning to look at him. Peter feels her hand rubbing little circles on his lower back. “Why don’t you stay and eat with us?”

 

Scott looks between Peter and Lydia, finally conceding with a nod. “Sure,” Scott answers, and he stays long enough with them to eat and talk, but the entire time, Peter’s eyes follow Scott across the table and take note of his body language, his tone of voice, his preferred questions, and the way he glances at Lydia.

 

Peter is mistrustful of his intentions, and all throughout their meal, he begins to convince himself that Scott didn’t talk to Sheriff Stilinski for the benefit of Lydia’s safety against the pack of Alphas that are seeking her out.

 

He begins to think Scott talked to Stilinski because of him, but for now, he keeps the thoughts to himself.

 

-

 

Later that night when they are in bed and Lydia is resting in the crook of his arm, her head lying against his shoulder and her hand on his chest, Peter runs a hand along her arm and ghosts his blunt fingernails back down the opposite way. His mind dwells on his earlier doubts about Scott. Halfway amidst his thoughts, his hand stills, fingers lifting from her until only the tips remain touching her skin.

 

“I don’t trust him,” Peter says to her in the dark. Lydia isn’t moving very much, but he feels the sudden stillness that overcomes her at his words.

 

“What do you mean?” she asks quietly.

 

“Scott,” he tells her. “Stilinski said he sent him over. To watch our house.”

 

He feels her swallow above his chest. “He was just trying to help,” Lydia reasons in a soft voice. It’s not something she wants to argue with Peter, but she also isn’t leaping up to Scott’s defense given her tone. “You know he just wants to help. Erica and him can’t be here all the time. It makes sense to . . . ”

 

Peter lays his hand against her arm. “His help led to last night.”

 

Lydia is silent at first. He can feel her breathe in and out. Her hand clutches at his shirt gently, and she burrows her face closer to his chest. “I’ll talk to him,” Lydia says. “He’ll be honest with me.”

 

Peter reaches out, placing two fingers underneath Lydia’s chin. Gently, he urges her face upward until they are looking at one another. He only stares at first, eyes passing over her delicate features, round eyes and soft cheeks. Letting go of her chin, Peter runs his fingertips along her cheek. “Of course,” he says.

 

Of course Scott will be honest with her. Peter knows in his heart that Scott wants to take her away. The boy doesn’t want Lydia for himself, though; he is still too pre-occupied with the daughter from a long line of werewolf hunters to even see the danger in his fascination with the girl, but he wants to save the world. Do the right thing. And he thinks Peter is the wrong thing. Ever since the night he found Peter pinning Lydia to the wall outside of her bedroom, fearing violence, and left them alone only to hear them fucking minutes later.

 

Scott has been against Peter ever since. Peter knows it now. A challenge here, a question there. Scott’s recent helpfulness only strikes Peter as another front in a long line of events that involve trying to separate Peter from Lydia. Until the boy realized it was futile, and then he sought to play nice. But he was only going to play nice until the day came that he could resume his original purpose.

 

Peter may be Scott’s Alpha, but Scott has already turned against him in his heart. Very soon, he will turn away from him completely. Peter doesn’t know when, and he doesn’t know how. But he knows it’s coming.

 

His grip tightens on Lydia’s arm, and she wriggles against it. “Peter—”

 

It must hurt her, so he lets go.

 

Peter removes his arm from under her and sits up on the bed. He stares off until he bends forward and runs both hands over his head. Behind him, Lydia swears and he looks over his shoulder at her. She is sitting upright, too, and holding her arm, and he sees—even in the dark—the blossoming red handprint as it begins to appear on her fair skin. Accidentally, Peter must have channeled his werewolf strength. He didn’t mean to use it on her.

 

He has never done that before. He has always been able to keep it in check.

 

He meets her indignant eyes. “I’m sorry,” Peter says.

 

“I have _school_ ,” Lydia retorts hotly. “How many long sleeve shirts do you think I own?”

 

“It was an _accident_ —”

 

“Oh, like Sheriff Stilinski’s accident—”

 

The burst of anger comes like the one just before it, and Peter reacts before he can truly think about what he is doing. He shoves Lydia until she is lying on the bed again and he is towering over her, crouched and straddling her waist, and he can feel the bolt of fear flatten her spine beneath him. He doesn’t do anything. Peter has no intention of hurting Lydia, but she is terrified of him, he realizes. In that moment she is petrified, her eyes full of fear as she lies flat and doesn’t move.

 

Confusion settles into his face, and Peter slowly tilts his head as his eyes narrow. “Scott did this to you, didn’t he?” he asks, and Lydia’s jaw falls slack.

 

“ . . . Scott?” Lydia repeats in disbelief. “Scott’s not here, Peter. _You’re_ the one who just shoved me—”

 

“I’ve shoved you plenty of times,” Peter reasons, remembering every turbulent, heated encounter between the two of them in these walls. Given the conversation at hand, his voice is strangely calm. “It’s never scared you before.”

 

On the contrary, she has always liked it.

 

It’s true, and Lydia knows it’s true. It has always been a game to them, this tug of war, this push and pull, to see how far the boundaries can go before it’s too far and it’s too much. And it’s never been too far, and it’s never been too much, and Lydia’s never shrunk away from him like she is genuinely scared of what he can do. Except for the bite. The bite is always the exception.

 

Peter’s eyes scan her face. “What’s changed?”

 

Lydia stares at him, and she opens her mouth, but no words come out. Faltering, she bites down on her lower lip. “You wanted to kill a man,” she suddenly says, admitting it, being honest with him, and her lip trembles. “You wanted to _kill_ him because of me, and he was just doing his job—”

 

“He would’ve had you taken away—”

 

“—he has a _son_. He’s a single father—”

 

“What was I _supposed_ to do?” Peter demands, leaning in too close, his face inches away from her. “Get arrested? _Lose_ you?” His voice is feverish. “Is that what you expected?”

 

“You know,” Lydia bites back, “I never _thought_ about it.”

 

“But you’re thinking about it now, aren’t you?”

 

The silence between them as Lydia glares him down feels like acid poured onto a wound, and Peter recoils from it, climbing off of her and off the bed. He knew he would pay for the other night at some point, but he doesn’t want to face it now. He walks away from it. He stalks out of the room, leaving Lydia alone, and goes downstairs to pace and to think.

 

Except his thoughts are all a storming rage, and he just ends up throwing a glass across the kitchen to break it against the wall.

 

It makes a satisfying smash, but it changes nothing.

 

-

 

The doorbell rings a few days later in the early afternoon, and Peter answers it to the last face he ever expected to see again.

 

Jackson stands there with his hands inside his jacket pockets, a cloudy sky above, and a sour look of determination on his face. He has the audacity to glare at Peter as if that last encounter never happened between them. As if he has some upper ground. Jackson raises his chin, his look sharpening.

 

Peter speaks up first. “I thought I told you never to come around here again,” he says with a deadly calm.

 

“No,” Jackson corrects him, “you didn’t. You said ‘if I ever see you around Lydia again,’ which, by the way, is pretty fucking different from ‘if I ever see you around here again.’ Besides, I’m not here for her. I’m here for you.”

 

“Is that so?”

 

Jackson nods at Peter. “I know what you’re up to. You think I’m an idiot, that I wouldn’t catch on, but I knew something was up with you the moment I set eyes on you.” Jackson huffs, shaking his head. “You’ve been running around, giving a gift to losers who don’t deserve it. Scott, Erica, you think they got what it takes?” The boy leans forward, gesturing forcefully at his own chest. “ _I’m_ what it takes, so you’re gonna give me the fucking bite. You’re gonna make me one of you.”

 

Peter can’t believe his ears. His eyes widen, but he actually laughs. “You think I would give the bite to _you_?” He doesn’t even bother to deny it. If Jackson knows, then he either talked or threatened Scott or Erica or both of them. Or he has been following them around and saw some things he wasn’t meant to see.

 

The confidence doesn’t waver from Jackson’s eyes. “Yeah, you’ll give the bite to me. You wanna know why? Because I know all about your little obsession with your _niece_. Yeah, Lydia told me all about that. You, sneaking into her room when she was asleep, trying to touch her, trying to—”

 

Peter’s canines elongate, and he moves forward to launch at Jackson, to drag the boy into his house and out of sight so he can rip his throat out, but Jackson is smart. Smarter than Peter initially gave him credit for. The boy whips out his phone and holds it out to the side, his thumb right above the keypad.

 

“You think I’m an idiot?” Jackson asks, his thumb poised and at the ready. “You think I don’t have the sheriff’s station on speed dial? You think my father doesn’t have some of the cops in this town in his pocket? All I have to do is press a _button_ , and it sends out a message saying _exactly_ where I went and _exactly_ who I came to see, so you go ahead. Do something to me. This town will be crawling so far up your ass, you’ll never breathe free air again, Wagner.”

 

Peter blinks. He is caught in dumbfounded shock. Jackson thought this through down to the very last detail with great care. He came fully prepared for this.

 

He’s been waiting for this.

 

“I’d rather eat you for breakfast than give you the bite,” Peter grinds out slowly, and he means every word. “And if you come around here again, I will kill you.” It’s a promise, and one that he intends to keep.

 

Jackson waits for him to take the words back. When Peter doesn’t, the boy’s face twists with rage, and he backs away from the house. “You’ll regret this . . . ” he calls out, turning his back to Peter only when his feet hit the asphalt of the road. Jackson takes off in a run after that, phone still in his hand as a safety measure.

 

Peter clenches his fist around the door handle, crushing it in his palm.

 

-

 

Peter shoves Scott against the wall. “How does Jackson _know_?” he hisses.

 

“Peter, what are you doing!” Lydia demands.

 

“He must’ve been following me, I don’t know,” Scott says, stumbling over the words. He looks afraid of Peter for the first time. But Scott’s a horrible liar because he’s too good, and Peter hears the blip in his heart rate as he speaks the words.

 

“You’ve been working together, haven’t you,” Peter accuses with calm certainty. His eyes are wild, and so is the itching need to claw out Scott’s eyes. “The two of you, working to bring me down . . . ”

 

“What are you _talking_ about—” Scott says, but his heart gives him away a second time, too. Peter bares his canines and hisses, eyes flaring red, and raises his claws in the air above Scott.

 

A heavy blow against his back knocks the wind out of Peter. It doesn’t hurt him, but it gives Scott a chance to escape Peter’s grasp and arm himself with his own claws and fangs a few feet away. Peter stumbles and turns around just in time to see Lydia still holding Scott’s lacrosse stick in both of her hands.

 

“Lydia—”

 

Scott cuts him off. “You’re not my Alpha anymore, _Peter_.”

 

“Scott,” Lydia calls out, still holding the lacrosse stick. She doesn’t take her eyes from Peter. “Please leave. Now.” Scott takes her advice and leaves, and though Peter knows he could take Lydia, he doesn’t try anything. He leans into the wall, tips the back of his head against it, and stares at her.

 

“You’re defending the wrong people, Lydia,” Peter tells her.

 

“No,” she says, shaking her head, “I’m defending them from you.”

 

He smiles, but there is no happiness to it. Peter rolls his head to the side, closing his eyes. “You’ll see,” he says softly. Reopening his eyes, he focuses them on her. “But when you do, it’ll be too late.”

 

Lydia stands her ground, but it doesn’t stop her lower lip from trembling beneath the bite of her teeth.

 

-

 

The woods seem like a horrible place to meet in times like these, but Lydia feels a little safer with Erica at her side, the other girl complaining irritability about the overgrowth that snags at their clothes and yanks at her hair. Lydia, for her part, is wearing a beanie to protect most of her hair. The rest of it, though it’s down, is hidden beneath her coat collar, keeping her neck warmer in the freezing weather. Mittens shield her hands, too, but those are burrowed in her coat pockets out of sight.

 

Scott had sent her a note through Allison, asking her to meet him out here in the woods at nightfall. It seemed like a dumb idea, but Lydia needs to talk with Scott more than she is afraid of werewolves or the reminder of the forest where her parents had been murdered all those years ago. She thinks, or believes, that at least he knows what he is doing. Scott has never put her in danger before.

 

They reach a small clearing after a few minutes walk, and Lydia sees Scott before she spots the other figure with him. She stills once she notices the second person, and when he turns around from his restless pacing to face her direction, he falls still like Scott beside him. Her jaw falls slack, her core tenses up. She had thought Peter was imagining things, being paranoid, but he was right.

 

He was right.

 

Erica reaches her side and with a, “C’mon,” ushers Lydia into the clearing. Scott smiles warmly at her. Jackson, however, remains cool and distant.

 

Lydia approaches them slowly, looking between the two boys. “What is this?”

 

“We’re here to help you, Lydia,” Scott tells her. “We want to help you get away from Peter.”

 

“Wait, what?” Erica interrupts Scott, her brow furrowing in confusion. “What are you talking about? Why does she need to get away from Peter?” She looks over at Lydia. Erica’s hands are in her coat pockets now, too, but that doesn’t stop her from holding them outward, pulling her coat with it. “What’s going on?”

 

Jackson appears annoyed, sliding his jaw to the right. “Because he’s a disgusting, murderous pervert, what else?”

 

Erica looks a little dubious. “Because it’s nothing Lydia doesn’t want?”

 

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Jackson throws back.

 

“Lydia,” Scott says in his most reassuring voice. “Look, I know you haven’t left Peter because you think you have nowhere else to go, but my mother, she’ll take you in. She’ll adopt you. She’ll take care of you. You can _leave_ Peter. You’ll have a home. I promise.” Scott shakes his head, looking sad and lost all at once. “You don’t have to stay with him.”

 

Despite all of the reassuring words and promises, underneath it all, Lydia feels betrayed. She takes a step back from Scott and Jackson, her hands still in her pockets. “Have you two been working together?” she asks them both, glancing from Scott to Jackson. Lydia had thought Scott had been telling the truth. Scott would never lie to her, she thought, but now she isn’t so sure. “How long?”

 

Scott and Jackson share a look. “A couple of weeks,” Jackson finally answers her, turning back to face Lydia.

 

Jackson’s answer hits her like a blow to the chest, knocking the wind straight out of her lungs. Lydia takes a deep breath, trying to calm herself. “Were you lying, Scott?”

 

“To Peter, yeah,” Scott says, but Lydia closes her eyes and shakes her head.

 

“That wasn’t just Peter,” she says. “You’ve been lying to me, too.”

 

Scott shakes his head. “No, Lydia—”

 

“How can I trust you,” Lydia snaps, “if you’ve actually been working together to try and get Peter arrested? Without even talking to me? _Lying_ to me?”

 

“We’re trying to help you—”

 

“And that makes you the good guys _how_?” Lydia throws back at them, stepping back a foot. “You’re not even thinking about how this affects _my_ life. What if it goes public? Do you think I want the whole school to know? The whole town to know? This is my life, Scott. You’re playing with my _life_.”

 

“She’s got a point, Scott,” Erica chimes in.

 

Jackson steps forward. “Do you really wanna stay with that creep?”

 

Lydia turns to him, her face a stony visage. “As I recall, the last time you spoke to me, you called me a _psychopath_ ,” she says icily. “Why do you suddenly care, hmm?”

 

“Look, guys,” Scott interrupts. “All of this fighting, it’s getting us nowhere.”

 

“Yeah, which is exactly where I’m going with you,” Lydia says. “Nowhere.”

 

“Lydia, you can’t mean that—”

 

“Did you tell Sheriff Stilinski to watch our house because you were hoping he’d see something with Peter? Were you hoping he’d arrest him?” She isn’t sure why she is bothering with the question, but it’s another thing on a long list of things Lydia wants to know. She is sick of people lying to her. She is sick of things being hid from her as if she is some fragile china doll who will break at the first syllable of truth.

 

Scott’s immediate silence and frozen posture speaks volumes, and Lydia feels as if everything is crumbling down around her. All of the secure pillars she was standing on just days ago, they are all falling to dust beneath her.

 

“Scott, you didn’t—”

 

“It was for your own good—”

 

“I am _sick_ of people telling me what’s good for me!” Lydia hollers back at him. A sudden feeling of vertigo hits, and Lydia touches her forehead. “You know, the only person who gives a damn what I think and how I feel is Erica. Erica—” She reaches out for the other girl and clasps their hands together. Lydia’s is covered with a warm mitten, Erica’s is bare, but they grasp each other tight and hold fast. “—Walk me back home, please.”

 

Together, hand in hand, they turn away from the boys. Scott calls out to them, so does Jackson.

 

“Wait, Lydia! Erica!” Scott yells, leaping over dead debris and fallen logs to catch up with them. Lydia hears him skid down a slope of dried leaves. Pointedly, she ignores it. Behind him, Jackson hollers, “Are you for real? _Seriously_? I’m out—”

 

“Lydia, would you please wait and listen to me—”

 

“Go _away_ , Scott!” Lydia calls out, walking faster. “I think we’ve established that I don’t want to listen to you anymore!”

 

“Pity,” replies a new voice from nearby, “I would like to hear what else he has to say.”

 

Lydia freezes in place, a chill creeping down her spine. Her hand clutches tighter onto Erica’s fingers than before, while Erica senses immediately that something is wrong and lets go of Lydia’s hand. She moves to step in front of Lydia, hands out at her sides. Erica is poised in a perfect position to unleash her claws, but for now, she keeps them sheathed in her nail beds.

 

Scott skids to a halt behind them, sensing the danger as well. Lydia doesn’t move an inch, but she sees Scott move to her unguarded side. Unlike Erica, Scott does not wait. His claws are out, and so are his fangs.

 

Lydia doesn’t know the man’s voice, nor has she seen his face before tonight. He stands a fair distance from them, but still too close, dressed down in such a way that he seems unimposing and simplistic to the eye, but Lydia feels his energy—and it’s not good. She can tell he’s an Alpha through that alone. Despite the cane at his side, held aloft in one hand, he walks tall and assuredly. He is calm. It is a deadly sort of calm, and though it is nighttime, he wears a pair of shades over his eyes. She remembers, briefly, Peter saying something about how he is blind.

 

“Now, Scott,” Deucalion says, “that’s not very nice. I don’t have my weapons out, do I?”

 

Two more figures join in from the shadows, enclosing left and right. One is a tall and stocky male, nearly bald, and the other is a lithe female with dark hair. Their eyes glow red, and their claws come out as they hiss.

 

Erica hisses in response, releasing her own. Lydia feels her heart race inside of its ribcage. She looks left, and then right, hoping there is a way to escape. She wants to be home now in her bed where it’s warm and safe, and instead she followed a note given to her by Allison from Scott that led her out of her home and into this forest. Even with Erica at her side, even Scott, she isn’t safe.

 

She should have never left home.

 

“Ennis,” Deucalion announces calmly, lifting a finger and pointing over Lydia’s shoulder. “Fetch that human over there.”

 

 _Jackson_ , Lydia thinks, whipping her head over her shoulder to look back and see Jackson making a run for it in the distance. When she looks back, Ennis, the bald man, grins. He says nothing, but he chuckles as if the request amuses him.

 

Lydia gasps as he leaps forward and tears through the forest, leaving them alone with Deucalion and the woman at his right side. She doesn’t retract her claws or her fangs. She grins at the three of them, though, and takes a step forward until Deucalion halts her with his cane.

 

“Kali,” he warns gently. “No violence. Not yet.” Deucalion lets out a breath and lowers his cane. “I wasn’t expecting to gather all three of you, truth be told. It is an unexpected pleasure to retrieve at once all three of Peter Hale’s protégés.”

 

“Hale?” Lydia asks at the same time as Scott says, “Hale . . . ”

 

They turn to look at each other, mirroring each other’s speechless gaze.

 

“Oh, right,” Deucalion says. “I forgot. He goes by another name now. Is it James? Jack? Johnson?” Slowly, he shakes his head. “Either way, it makes no difference. All roads lead to this place.” He holds out his arms, gesturing at the trees around them. When his hands fall back to his sides, Deucalion looks forward. Though he cannot see, his eyes seem to settle right on Lydia.

 

“You,” he says decisively, raising his chin. “I’ve been waiting a long time for you, Lydia Martin.”

 

“If you want her, you’ll have to get through us _first_ ,” Scott threatens. On Lydia’s left, Erica hisses in agreement.

 

Deucalion only smiles.

 

“I thought you might say something like that.” Deucalion glances to woman the beside him. “Kali, let’s honor Scott’s request, shall we?”

 

Kali’s grin shows large gleaming canines. “With pleasure,” she says.

 

 


	13. The Enemy of My Enemy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _It's getting dark, darling, too dark to see._  
> 

_* * *_

 

Peter doesn’t fully realize the extremity of his situation until he finds himself on the roof of a house belonging to his sworn enemies, the local family of werewolf hunters he has been doing his best to avoid up until this moment. In the dead of the night with darkness and trees as his only friends, he perches on the shingles before the second story bedroom window belonging to the youngest of the three. He watches her through the translucent shade of the curtain as she walks around the room, looking for something she can’t seem to find.

 

A light rap of knuckle against the glass distracts Allison from her search, causing her head to whip towards the window. While the curtain and darkness hide him from her view, Peter sees the confused look she aims in his direction before she crosses the room to open the window. “Scott,” she laughs, “you _really_ should just walk up to the front door and knock like a normal—”

 

The amusement flees from her face as soon as Allison sees Peter on the other side of the curtain. A sharp gasp cuts the air as she jerks back involuntarily from the ledge, turning to snatch up an automatic bow she keeps loaded nearby for safety. Idly, Peter raises both of his hands to where she can see them and wonders if this was a part of Scott’s influencing as well.

 

Peter doesn’t wish to alarm her any more than he already has, though, especially considering the inopportune hour of his appearance—and at her window of all places, but he isn’t about to knock on the front door given the extracurricular pursuits of her family.

 

“Well, either you don’t have a very high opinion of me,” he suggests, “or you’re always prepared for the worst.”

 

Allison narrows her eyes at him with a tight smile on her lips, disbanding any beliefs he might have had a second ago about her being afraid of him. She most definitely is not. “I don’t have a very high opinion of men who climb onto my roof in the middle of the night to knock on my window,” Allison answers, her voice matching the look on her face. “So, cut to the chase. Why are you here?”

 

“May I lower my hands?”

 

“Yes, you may,” Allison says with a smile. “But I’m not lowering my bow.”

 

“Fair enough.” Peter drops his arms slowly, but he remains on the roof. He isn’t climbing into her bedroom. They can talk just fine like this. “I’m here because I need your help.”

 

Allison narrows her eyes again. “Scott said not to trust you.”

 

“Did he say why?”

 

Her lips tighten, brow furrowing. He sees her bow lower just a fraction. “No, not exactly. But he doesn’t trust you, and I don’t see why I should either.”

 

“Well, that’s fantastic,” Peter replies, the false saccharine sweetness of his words bleeding into an insipid smile. “Because Scott’s been kidnapped by three Alphas. Along with Lydia and Erica, and I can’t guarantee their safety if we don’t get to them soon. And as of this moment, I’m the only person trying to save them. So, maybe a little unity would go a long way right now.”

 

The bow drops without hesitation, and Allison’s skeptical glare is replaced with worry. “Where are they?”

 

“Are you going to help me or not?”

 

Despite the information Peter just gave her, she still has to debate it. Without a silver-tipped arrow aimed at his chest, he feels much better, but Allison’s guard remains up, even if the bow is down. After a long moment of silence, she finally raises her chin and concedes with a sigh. “Fine, I’ll help you, but how?”

 

“It’s going to take more than just you and me,” he says frankly. “We’ll need your whole family to face this. Armed and ready. They need to be prepared to fight three Alphas. Not betas, Allison. _Alphas_. Ruthless, bloodthirsty, vengeful Alphas. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

 

“How do I know this isn’t a trick?”

 

Peter feels his face fall. Any other time, he would have welcomed the grand idea of wiping out two generations of hunters at once, but there are more important things at stake than that. He wants the Alphas dead more than anything. Hunters he can deal with later, but the Alphas will never give up. And if they cancel each other out in a blaze of glory, all the better for him. Admittedly, he doesn’t care if Scott gets caught in the crossfire either. He wanted him dead, anyway, but Lydia . . . and Erica . . .

 

“Wow,” Peter manages, his eyebrows shooting up. “Does he really hate me that much?”

 

His words do the trick. Allison actually looks guilty. “I’m sorry,” she blurts out, lowering her eyes and touching her forehead. She gestures back at him. “You’re right. You’ve never attacked us. You haven’t harmed anyone. Scott, Erica, they made a choice.” She sighs. “I don’t know. Scott just said he has his reasons, and I trust Scott.”

 

Peter chooses his next words carefully. “And I don’t blame you for that. But he’s in trouble now, Allison. They all are, and this is the only way to save them. Can I count on you? Because I can’t take on three Alphas alone. Our powers combined, though? We could _do_ something about it.”

 

Allison doesn’t say _yes_ or _of course_ , but the decision she has made shines bright in her eyes. “What’s the plan?”

 

 _Victory_ , he thinks.

 

Peter suppresses the overwhelming urge to smile. “I have to get there first,” he informs her. “Deucalion isn’t expecting the extra company, and we don’t want to startle him. I will talk to him and try to bargain with them to hand Lydia, Erica, and Scott over safely. I doubt it will work, but it will distract him from noticing your approach while we negotiate. Take out his cohorts first. There’s a woman, Kali, and a man, Ennis. They’re both wildcards.” Peter looks up, tilts his head. “The woman, more so. If you don’t eliminate them first, there is no telling what they’ll do. I’ll go for Deucalion myself. Do you think you can handle that?”

 

“Yeah,” Allison responds, giving him a look. “What time do you need us to show up?”

 

While he doesn’t trust her, he also doesn’t have a choice. If he changes the time to later, they may be too late if Allison’s true to her word. If he gives her the correct time, she may show up too early and put them all in jeopardy.

 

Peter weighs the pros and cons, and goes with telling her the truth.

 

Better risk than no help at all.

 

With her agreement in hand, he departs from her house by leaping off the roof and making for the trees. Peter doesn’t fully transform, but an instinct takes over as he runs. His claws extend on their own. His canines grow out as a growl fills his throat. Red shines in his eyes, and wrath flows through him unlike anything he has felt in years as he tears through the trees, breaking their limbs as he marks a path for the Argents to follow. If they are even half of the hunters that history has made them out to be, then they’ll find his trail in the dark without flashlights.

 

When he is within distance of the meeting area, he slows down until he is barely moving. Listening for their presence, Peter detects a sound of movement not far from where he stands. He retracts his claws. The glow in his eyes fades to their normal blue. He is innocent and unassuming—or as much as he can appear to be for now. He doesn’t want to walk in looking as if he is ready for a fight. He needs them to let down their guard.

 

Peter makes his way toward the noise of crunching footfalls as quietly as possible.

 

“I was beginning to think you wouldn’t make it,” Deucalion calls out, and Peter halts. Despite his attempts to be quiet, they still heard him coming. He walks out of the brush without attempting to hide anymore.

 

He wonders how close the Argents will be able to get.

 

In the small clearing he gets a full view of the situation. Lydia is standing beside Deucalion, through no will of her own, fighting back the tremble in her bones by clenching her fists together tightly as Kali eyes her and walks to and fro, sniffing the fear she emanates. Erica is unconscious on the ground, blood on her face and her clothes. A faint heart beat tells Peter she is still alive, though left unattended by the Alphas. Ennis stands behind Scott with a firm grip on his shoulder. Scott is awake, though he kneels on the ground. A busted lip, now healed, is still caked in blood. He also still bears a few marks that have not healed all the way yet. His shirt is torn, soaked in blood by a deep gash in his stomach. He breathes, but it takes all his effort.

 

“I have to admit,” Peter says, walking up to them but keeping his distance. “I’m surprised there was an offer at all.”

 

“I’m not an unreasonable man.”

 

Peter lifts his eyebrows at that, but he keeps his sharp remarks to himself. Now is not the time.

 

“I won’t harm her,” Deucalion continues in a soothing voice. He glances down at Lydia beside him, and she bristles at the mention of her without looking at either one of them. “She’s useful to me. I wouldn’t have spent all this effort to kill her, so you know she’s in good hands.”

 

Peter is silent at first. “Not killing is not the same as in good hands.”

 

A faint sliver of moonlight catches on Deucalion’s sunglasses as he angles his head at the statement. “You would know all about that, wouldn’t you, Peter?”

 

This time it is Peter’s turn to bristle.

 

“I could kill you and your betas and just take her,” Deucalion suggests louder, reminding Peter of what’s at stake. “But I’ve always thought ‘two birds, one stone’ was a better way of handling things. I’m sure it’s a saying you have some familiarity with. We need another Alpha, Peter, and you’re more than capable.” A wicked smile appears. “You put Ennis to shame.”

 

An offended grunt comes from the other werewolf, but Deucalion ignores it.

 

“I would like to extend an invitation for you to join our ranks. Become one of us, and you won’t have to leave your precious banshee’s side ever again. You can both join us. There’s only one requirement. Kill your betas, Peter, and we’ll be one big happy family.”

 

“No—” Lydia protests, but Kali hisses at her, leaning in close to her face. Lydia flinches at her proximity, saying no more.

 

Peter holds out his hands, flicking open his claws. He feels his teeth elongating in his mouth.

 

Scott hisses, “I _knew_ it.”

 

Peter always did like a good surprise.

 

“I won’t kill them,” he says at last, “but I’ll gladly kill you.”

 

Deucalion’s back stiffens. He wasn’t expecting this. Scott looks caught off guard, too. Even Lydia seems surprised, her jaw falling slack as she stares at him. They all thought he would jump at a chance to kill Scott, but there are too many cons associated with the blood falling on his hands. Peter needs someone else to do it, not him.

 

“What a shame,” Deucalion finally says. “I thought you might choose Lydia over them, especially after all the trouble you went through to get her.”

 

Confusion sets in Lydia’s features. Slowly, she turns to look at Peter. “What is he talking about, Peter?”

 

Her voice quavers.

 

She is already doubting him.

 

“Oh, he didn’t tell you?” Deucalion smiles. His amusement is obvious. He likes being privy to information that might cause damage. “He’s not your real uncle, Lydia. He murdered the real one. Assumed his identity, so he could adopt you. A wolf in sheep’s clothing.” His smile grows, showing razor-sharp teeth. “What a happy family.”

 

Lydia shakes her head. “No, it’s not true—”

 

“But it does explain a lot,” Deucalion continues relentlessly. “He shows up out of the blue once both of your parents are gone. No one to claim you, but there he is. Miraculously, there to save you. Or,” Deucalion pauses, turning his head to Lydia, both of his hands placed neatly atop the pommel of his cane, “did he just enfold you in a new nightmare?”

 

Peter lets out a growl, his eyes flashing red. Lydia is torn, glancing between them both. On one hand Deucalion murdered her parents, but Peter also murdered her uncle. She doesn’t know it for sure, but there has been enough doubt as of late to make Lydia panic and some part of her believes it’s possible. She probably recalls every moment that Peter gave her to question, places them in a neat little row inside her head, and adds them all up and sees the connection.

 

It’s possible. The probability is too high for her to deny. She even accused Peter of killing her parents once. It wasn’t so far off of the mark.

 

Lydia shows no favor toward either of them as her gaze flits back and forth. Her eyes scream _run_ , run far, far away, neither of them are safe, and she inches away from both men until she bumps into Kali. Lydia then lets out a scream, setting off a chain of events.

 

It all happens at once.

 

Peter lunges for Deucalion while a silver-tipped arrow flies through the air and embeds itself in Ennis’ shoulder. Ennis lets out a howl, and Kali shoves Lydia to the ground to frighten her into cowering before she leaps into the fight. A second arrow whizzes past Peter’s shoulder, narrowly missing Deucalion’s face as the other werewolf dodges a possible killing blow. He transforms in front of Peter, skin turning to leathery dusk as his eyes flash red and he roars in Peter’s face.

 

They tumble to the ground in a heap of damp leaves and moist dirt, rolling over and lashing out claws to rip at each other in their weakest spots. Peter manages to get the upper hand and pins the other Alpha down in the mud as he goes for the throat, but Deucalion uses a tremendous force in his arms to throw Peter off of him and send him flying backwards.

 

His back collides with a tree, a loud _crack_ filling the air as it splinters in two.

 

He hits the ground, his palms catching his fall. When he looks over, he sees Erica unconscious beside him in the grass. Peter grabs her as another _crack_ sounds off the tree’s collapse, and he rolls her out of the way before the whole trunk crashes into the ground where they had just been lying.

 

Ennis collapses to his knees, too, multiple arrows protruding from his chest. One fateful tip is lodged in his neck. He falls with nothing more than a quiet thump.

 

Kali’s scream of rage mixed with anguish tears a rent into the sky.

 

She charges forward, wrenching Scott to his feet and using his body as a human shield before Allison can scream, “ _No!_ ” at the silver arrow headed his way. Peter takes his moment. He leaps to his feet and lunges for Deucalion while the other wolf is temporarily distracted by what has just happened; he gets his claws in the jugular and rips, sinks his teeth into the other side of Deucalion’s neck and tears out a chunk of flesh. He rips and rips and rips until the heart has stopped beating in the Alpha’s chest.

 

He wants no surprises coming back from the dead.

 

Peter quickly drops the body and looks around for Lydia in his bloodlust to see her tearing off into the darkness by herself. He hesitates only long enough to turn back and scoop up Erica, throwing her over his shoulder before running off into the woods after Lydia.

 

He leaves the Argent hunters to deal with Kali on their own.

 

Lydia runs for a long time, longer than Peter expected her to have the energy for, falling only when she twists her ankle on a branch in the dark. She cries out in real pain, sobbing because she cried the whole way here and she heard the running footsteps behind her and she was too afraid to look back, but now it’s too late to get away and it’s all over now. There is no going back.

 

Peter gently lowers Erica to the ground, her body rustling the leaves. He creeps slowly toward Lydia, crouching close to the ground.

 

He emerges from the darkness, and Lydia looks up, gasping, her eyes full of fear.

 

She tries to crawl backwards. Scrambles, really, until she hits a tree, and then she turns away long enough to size it up and to try and crawl around it, still sobbing. She trembles all over, head to toe. Her whole body is going into convulsions, and Lydia tries to breathe, but she only wheezes, unable to catch her breath, which just scares her more.

 

Peter recognizes the panic attack for what it is. He also realizes, belatedly, that his face is smeared with blood, his mouth and chin covered in it. He goes to wipe it away with his hand, but pauses. Peter stares at his hand. It is coated in blood as well, a red glove in the moonlight.

 

He must be a horrific sight for her eyes.

 

“—Leave me alone, _please_ , leave me alone—”

 

“Lydia,” Peter tries, his voice as soft as possible.

 

“No, no, no, go _away_ —”

 

“Lydia—” He reaches out for her, a red gloved hand. The still wet blood from his fingertips smears over her pale skin, her flesh crawling with the sensation. Lydia jerks away from him, sobbing harder for it. She can barely breathe. Her words are nearly a whisper now.

 

“—please don’t hurt me—”

 

“Lydia, I am not going to hurt you. See?” He holds up both bloody hands, a sign of surrender. Lydia manages a small glance in his direction. He is a sight—caked in blood from mouth, cheeks, chin, and neck all the way down to his hands and wrists. Most of it still glistens fresh.

 

She blinks, not really seeing him, only the horror. Lydia shakes her head, eyelids fluttering. “I don’t know who you are,” she breathes out, her eyes watering up. “I don’t know you.” She shakes her head again, her lips trembling in fear.

 

“Of course you know who I am—”

 

“Did you kill my uncle?”

 

Peter pauses. He shouldn’t. He should answer her right away, but as much as he has conditioned her, she has conditioned him, too. She has conditioned him to be more honest with her, so honest that he pauses before he can lie to her because he has to stop and think _do I really want to do this?_

 

Lydia inhales a shaky breath, and the tears fall. She knows this, too.

 

“Oh my god . . . ”

 

“Lydia,” Peter says, using her name on purpose. Knowing the use of first names is personal, how it connects them emotionally as long as he keeps saying it. He reaches out for her again. “Nothing has changed—”

 

Lydia yanks back from him. “ _Get away from me!_ ” she snaps through her tears.

 

It’s her first sign of aggression towards him. It’s not true aggression, but then she has never been a violent person. Smart and cunning, yes. Violent, no.

 

Peter controls his expression. He shakes his head and tries to speak reason to her. “Lydia, you’ve twisted your ankle. I’m not leaving you out here alone like this. It’s not safe—”

 

She starts crying again, silent sobs that shake her chest. He realizes she’s having a break from reality. Tonight, all of it, was just too much for her to handle. Lydia can’t process everything that has happened to her on top of all that was revealed to her. It’s too much trauma at once, and her system is trying to shut it all out to get away from it. Worst of all, he can’t leave her like this. He can’t just abandon her in the woods. He won’t do it. There are many other horrible things he’s done, things he’s not sure he would even take back, but he can’t leave her here like this. Even if he has to carry her kicking and screaming away from here, he will bring her someplace safe to see to her ankle. Someplace safe, where she can rest.

 

In the silence between them, Peter inches closer toward her. She doesn’t seem to notice until he is right there, reaching out for her again, and she fights back. She throws her arms at him, but he catches them deftly. She cries, fearing the worst, and Peter just holds her wrists until she stops struggling so much and the fight goes out of her. Afterwards, he pulls her toward him, enveloping her slight form in his arms and cradling her head against his chest as he runs his fingers through her hair. He shushes every sob, every flinch, and every shudder as she refuses the comfort he tries to give her. In between her sobs she asks where is Scott, begs for Erica, and asks for everyone but him. _Anyone but you_ , she says, _anyone but you_.

 

But Scott is shot, likely dead by now, and Erica is coming with him, too. If Kali is still alive, she’ll rip Lydia apart just for the revenge of what happened to Ennis and Deucalion, and Peter doesn’t trust the Argents. Lydia is banshee, a creature. She’s not a human, not a normal girl. He won’t hand her over to them. He won’t let them take her away.

 

Peter glides his fingers over her back, feeling her start to go still. Her cries turn into irregular breathing, and he combs his fingers through her hair until she shivers at his touch. When he swipes the hair aside from her neck, baring it to the chill night air, it’s a different type of shiver. It’s also not a decision he makes lightly.

 

She’s broken, and he made her that way.

 

This is his fault.

 

Swallowing past the knot in his throat, Peter extends his claws and places them carefully at the back of her neck. He remembers the burning, and he knows the pain will be worse this time, but this isn’t about him. He isn’t doing this so she’ll stay with him, and he isn’t even doing it so she’ll trust him either.

 

It’s the only way he knows to take away the pain, the only way she’ll be whole again.

 

He sinks his claws into the back of her neck, and as her memories flash before his eyes, Peter absorbs the most painful ones into himself with a white hot lance that makes his teeth grit so hard his gums bleed.

 

He has to bite halfway through his tongue just to swallow the scream.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to take a moment to talk about Peter's actions at the end. I know it probably seems like a deus ex machina where some magical trope just "fixes" the problem, Peter gets what he wants, Lydia has no choice in the matter, etc., but that's definitely not what's going to happen. Did Peter take her memory? Yes. Does that mean Lydia won't find out? Negatory. I love things that backfire. I love it when a perfect plan unravels from the smallest forgotten seam. Is what Peter did wrong? Yes. Will there be unforeseen consequences? Yes. Next chapter, in fact. I just wanted to say that because despite Peter's plan, well, Lydia's going to find out anyway. (Just in case anybody thought this was going to end on some weird happy-love note in the next chapter because no, that's not what this story is about.)


	14. Let Sleeping Dogs Lie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _You understand I’ve got a plan for us._  
> 

_* * *_

 

With her bare feet resting on the dash and tapping in tune with the beat of a song on the radio, Lydia feels a prompt kick at the back of her seat that interrupts her reading of _Thermodynamic Asymmetry in Time_. Removing her feet from the dash, she whirls around and aims a petrifying glare at Erica in the backseat.

 

“Do you mind, Erica?” Lydia retorts, annoyed, holding up the book in one hand. “I’m trying to read.”

 

Erica answers her with a lopsided grin, exposing two rows of perfectly gleaming white teeth behind a veil of red lipstick. Somehow it makes her disheveled hair, which already looks as though it hasn’t been washed or brushed in the last five days, look coy and sexy. “I’m changing,” Erica throws back, reclining back to zip up and button her pants. She offers another shit-eating grin before pulling off her shirt to toss it aside and snatching up a second one in the seat beside her that she pulled out of a bag from the back.

 

“Really?” Lydia says, sitting forward again. “In a moving car?” She looks over at Peter in the driver seat. “Aren’t you gonna say something to her?”

 

Peter seems impassive towards the current conversation. His eyes are focused on the road ahead, narrowing just slightly, both hands on the steering wheel at a ten and two position. His indifference is totally frustrating. Lydia’s father always did everything to appease her attitude and make sure it didn’t turn into a full-blown temper, but Peter just sits there, completely unaffected by it.

 

It strikes her as an odd comparison to suddenly make. Lydia pauses, confused by her thoughts, and shakes it off.

 

“Fine,” she snaps, returning her eyes, if not her attention, back to the book in her hands. “Don’t.”

 

Peter sighs beside her, but again he doesn’t answer. Lydia finds herself biting the inside of her cheek. She doesn’t want to leave Beacon Hills, but Peter never gave her a choice in the matter. She remembers only bits and pieces of what happened in the forest. Exhaustion as well as injuries took a toll on her body and mind until remembering itself was crawling on her knees over splintered fragments of glass, trying to put the pieces all together again. Each shard sliced her, so the memories came away smeared and fuzzy, blackened with blood, with no full picture. Just glints of possibilities that didn’t make any sense.

 

Lydia has this recollection later on of Peter carrying her somewhere in his arms, a swirl of nauseating darkness clouding up her mind, and she remembers drifting in and out of that feeling. She woke up some unidentified amount of hours later in the backseat of a moving vehicle with Erica in the front seat and Peter driving. She began to hyperventilate, sending herself right into a panic attack. It was like waking up after a drunken blackout. Lydia didn’t know where she was or who had her, while the last thing she could remember was Deucalion speaking in his amiable tone, which was more terrifying than the idea of him roaring in rage, as Kali’s red eyes loomed over her field of vision. They had to pull over the car just to calm her down.

 

They went to a rest stop after that. Booked a motel for the night. Lydia fell asleep in the bed with Erica instead of the one with Peter, but woke up in the middle of the night and migrated to Peter’s bed because he stroked her hair and kissed her forehead, and then it wasn’t so scary anymore. Waking up on the highway in the backseat of a car with no memories and lots of bruises and torn, dirty clothes, and so she cried like she was four years old until he shushed her to sleep. His touch soothed away the pain wherever his fingers grazed over her skin, leaving goose bumps in their wake.

 

Much to her surprise, all of her things had been packed for the trip. Lydia went through them the next morning because what would Peter know about what she wanted to bring and what she didn’t, but somehow he had anticipated that, too. He must have packed everything she owned just to be safe. Nothing was missing that she could immediately see, and Lydia even found a photo book amongst the items of the third box. She slipped it into her bag to bring it in the front of the car with her.

 

Maybe old pictures of her Mom and Dad smiling back at her through the camera lens is better than nothing at all—and feeling the heavy photo album bounce against her hip when she walks is strangely comforting, too.

 

It’s going to be a long ride, after all. She needs something to do. Peter hasn’t even told her where they are going. That, too, she holds against him.

 

Erica is the opposite. She is unendingly chipper about the sudden road trip, and then Lydia wonders if her parents even know where she is. She thinks they must, or Peter would have to worry about the cops for taking a minor off somewhere without their permission. She chews her lip, closing the book and reaching in her bag for the photo album as she puts the other one away.

 

Placing her feet back onto the dash, she opens the photo album and flips through the pages. Lydia sees herself grow up before her own eyes, the ghost of a smile appearing on her lips as her fingers glide over the cool plastic. The AC chills the pages, the cool air washing over her legs as well.

 

She finds her fifth birthday party. There are children her own age, but adults are there as well. She recognizes none of the faces and peels back the plastic, pulling out one of the photos. Names are written on the back in a scratchy cursive script. Lydia places the photo back, recognizing some of the names, but not all of them. She finds a photo of her parents with another couple, all of them either grinning or laughing. Curiosity itches at her, so she peels back the flap and pulls it out.

 

Flipping it over, she sees her parents’ names listed first.

 

Then, it reads _Vivian S. Wagner & James P. Wagner_.

 

Lydia pauses, flipping it back. She recognizes her aunt. It’s been years since Aunt Vivian’s death, and Lydia last saw her when she was just a kid. She remembers the face, though.

 

As her eyes travel back to her uncle’s face in the picture, a chill creeps along her spine and settles into the pit of her stomach.

 

Lydia swallows past a catch in her throat. The man in the picture has light, fluffy blonde hair. Nineties hair. He looks like lifeguard. He has that Californian look and a smile to match, tanned skin, and a chiseled jaw.

 

He is not the man sitting next to her, driving the vehicle.

 

She tries to factor in age. A lot can change in a decade, but there is no reconciling the differences between them. The face is completely different. The build is even different, too. The man in the photo is sitting down, but he’s taller than Peter. She can see how her uncle towers over his wife and her parents, even in a chair. She remembers now how tall he was, but she was just a child in those days. Everyone was tall.

 

She looks at another photo just to make sure. Placing this one back, Lydia plucks out a second one—of him looking directly at the camera and smiling—and reads the back.

 

 _James P. Wagner_.

 

The photo goes back into its allotted slot. With a dead weight behind her fingers, Lydia continues to flip through the pages as if relishing the memories the photos bring, but it’s nothing more than an outward show. She only does it to prevent drawing any attention to herself. With a deep breath and a quiet hum to go along with the radio, she feels almost a little normal again.

 

Beside her, Peter speaks up. “Is everything all right?”

 

Lydia freezes. She forgets. She keeps forgetting he can hear things, like the quick beat of her heart due to fear. It crosses Lydia’s mind once more how she doesn’t know where they are going, and it makes her think of a million missing persons cases of people her and Erica’s age who vanish into thin air and are never found. It makes her think of Peter crouched over the man in the photos, claws dripping black in the moonlight and eyes glowing red, and it makes her wonder _why me_.

 

He wanted her from the start. It hadn’t mattered how old she was. He wanted to foster this relationship in time. Wanted her to come to him. Wanted her despair and her desire to war with each other until she dropped her panties and climbed on top of him and rode him until she stopped questioning where the idea came from when it was his hands on her, comforting her, and his kiss on her forehead and his sweet words attentively and purposefully placed inside her ear to lure her into thinking this was all her idea because he was so _good_ to her.

 

He wanted to change her, _remake_ her. He targeted her like a predator and enacted a plan to ensure it. Never once gave her a choice to choose it, just thrust it upon her. Her heart is pounding fast at every revelation. She can hear it beating loud in her ears.

 

“Lydia,” comes his worried voice beside her. “Do you want me to pull over the car?”

 

Wordlessly, Lydia nods. The car comes to a standstill on the side of the road, and she pushes open the door with sweaty palms and fumbles barefoot into pebbles that pinch the bottom of her feet with each step.

 

She thinks of fleeing. For one brief moment, she considers running straight ahead into the open clearing that stretches out for miles, but Lydia knows she wouldn’t get far. He’s faster than her. Peter would catch her. He would come after her for sure, and she couldn’t leave Erica behind like that, anyway.

 

Defeated, she falls to her knees in the dirt. Lydia leans her weight onto her palms and takes a deep breath to calm her nerves. She wants to go back. Back home. To the house where she grew up in, in her old bedroom, curl up and go to sleep. Her eyes open to daisies and whishing grass, and somewhere behind her she hears Erica’s voice.

 

“ . . . Hey, Lyds, are you okay?”

 

Lydia blinks once to clear her mind, then twice to focus, and looks over her shoulder. Erica is leaning halfway out of an open door. Peter stands beside the car on his side, hand on the roof, watching her with an unreadable expression. Lydia meets his expression with a head-on gaze, and she has to trick her body into feeling safe, recalling lie after lie in her memory of him lulling her into a false sense of security with him at her side.

 

It’s easier than it should be, and her heart beat slows down, the anxiety leaving her. She smiles, something she shouldn’t be capable of doing at all genuinely, but it’s genuine enough on the outside and it doesn’t hurt within like she thought it might.

 

“I just,” Lydia says, pausing to look for the right words, “ . . . needed to breathe.”

 

When she gets back in the car, everyone is silent and the radio is on again. There is a song playing about wanted criminals being on the run, and Lydia thinks of a plan as Peter reaches over and places his hand on her thigh, his thumb rubbing gentle circles along her bare skin just beneath the hem of her skirt. He must think he is being comforting.

 

It tingles, so she lets him, even though it hikes up the beat of her heart to a skip and he notices it like she thought he would.

 

She has a plan, though, so she has somewhere to start.

 

 


	15. Unsteady

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _You’re trying to fight when you feel like flying._  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **A/N:** Some extra warnings are needed for this chapter. Nothing physical happens, but take caution if you are triggered easily due to Lydia's thought process of what she is going through with her newfound knowledge and fear of Peter.

_* * *_

 

Lydia doesn’t sleep for the first three days.

 

By the fourth morning, she nods off at the dining table without realizing it until it’s already happened. It is nothing more than a micro-nap, but it’s something to ease her mind temporarily, even if it doesn’t quite sustain her. She wakes up in a jolt five minutes later to find, thankfully, that she is still alone.

 

She ends up staring at the door each night for hours on end, clutching the covers tightly in her fingers, even though the door is locked because she locked it. Lydia made sure she locked it. She checked it three times. She’s like a frightened child, huddling for safety by the nightlight from the monsters that might climb out if the light runs out, but Peter never comes for her when night falls. He leaves her to her own devices, though Lydia doesn’t know why.

 

It’s just too soon for her to pretend. She doesn’t have the strength to amuse him if he decides he wants something from her, but Peter gives Lydia her space like he did when they first met. He checks on her throughout the day to see how she is doing, asks her if she needs anything, but he doesn’t touch her like he did in the car. It’s as if he senses something is wrong. Or maybe, against all belief, he just has the common sense to give her space and time to heal after what she has been through.

 

But if he’s a murderer, why should he even care?

 

It’s two things she can’t reconcile.

 

If his fingers even touch her now at all, it is so light it’s as if he is afraid of leaving prints—like she is made of the finest porcelain and he might leave a smudge. And it’s true, he might. She feels fragile as if she might collapse at any moment.

 

Lydia’s heart quickens every time, too, and she has no excuse for it. Peter let his hand linger once. Maybe he read it differently. Desire, not fear. She was like that in the beginning. Her heart would spike every time he touched her, and she once loved the attention and reveled in it. Peter had been handsome; he still is, but his eyes seem more unfriendly with this new revelation, colder than they did before.

 

She senses secrets hidden underneath them, but she doesn’t pry under the lid.

 

Not yet.

 

But she will.

 

She doesn’t have a choice. Lydia tells herself that as she resolves the plan in her head. She knows she has to get close to him again if she expects it to work. After only three days in this new place, she discovers on the fourth day after a trip to Best Buy that this new placement isn’t temporary when Peter passes her by in the hallway and says to her as he keeps walking by, “You and Erica have to get enrolled in school tomorrow, so set an alarm—”

 

Lydia’s eyes go wide. “ _Excuse_ me?” she says immediately, interrupting him.

 

Peter halts in the middle of the hallway. He wasn’t expecting that. When he turns to face her, he looks as though she just slapped him. “You heard me,” he finally says.

 

“ _No_ ,” Lydia declares loudly, heading straight for the front door again. “I will _not_ stay here—” Never mind there is still a bag in her hands, evidence of her earlier excursion. Never mind that she has none of her things packed. Never mind she does not even know what Peter did with the car he bought her for her fifteenth birthday because they only came up here with one vehicle. Never mind that she has been staying in this smaller house with Peter and Erica in a town she only learned the name of after living in it for three days, she isn’t familiar with the local area yet, and she doesn’t even know if Peter owns the place or if it belonged to someone he killed—

 

Peter grabs her wrist. Lydia’s first instinct is to shove him away, and so she does. He isn’t using his full strength because she succeeds in getting his hand off of her, and then she stalks away again.

 

“Lydia—”

 

She whirls on him. “Stop that! Stop saying my name like that!”

 

“What is _wrong_ with you—”

 

Lydia can’t stop herself. _Wrong with me?_ she thinks. _What’s wrong with me?_ “You have _no right_ to take me away from my home!” she hollers at him. “You can’t just carry me off in the middle of the night—”

 

“I am your guardian,” Peter interrupts, his eyes blazing without changing color. “I will take you anywhere I please.”

 

Lydia backs away from him. She feels her knees go weak beneath her. The threat is so real now, it scares her. She knows too much. She knows more than he meant for her to know, and Lydia wants to shrink into the corner, even though it won’t get her any further away from him.

 

His expression softens instantly, guilt clouding his pale blue eyes. “Lydia,” Peter murmurs, kneeling down beside her. When did she get on the floor? “Please,” he adds in a soft voice, his hand curling around hers. “I didn’t mean it like that. Will you let me explain? Things are more complicated than you’re aware of.”

 

“Then why haven’t you told me?” she whispers, her voice feeling disconnected from her body. She feels his hand run along her ear, combing through her hair, a gesture she has always loved but feels differently about now. She closes her eyes, gulping.

 

“I thought it was too much for you to handle at once,” Peter murmurs, his voice near her temple. “I was trying to protect you.”

 

“What happened?” Lydia asks. “Why are we here?”

 

“Deucalion and Ennis are dead, but Kali survived,” he tells her. “She’ll come for you. To kill you for what happened. We couldn’t stay there, Lydia. We couldn’t stay . . . ”

 

“ . . . Scott?” she manages in a croak.

 

Peter’s hand pauses. “He’s dead.”

 

Lydia sits there in shock, feeling Peter’s hand run over her hair but the sensation is almost foreign, like a ghost trying to comfort her, and when she goes back to her room, she deposits the bag on top of her bed and stares at the voice recorder she purchased just two hours ago. The sensible part of her brain says it was right of Peter to try and shield her from more pain so soon, but there is another even more sensible part that says if it wasn’t for Peter, then none of this would have happened in the first place.

 

She doesn’t know how true that is. Deucalion might have still come for her with or without Peter showing up afterwards. He must’ve been watching her, though, and following her to have learned so much about her life and her family before replacing one of them. She considers going to the police, but Peter has managed to evade them so far. He has enough legal proof of who he is that her word will be written down as post-traumatic stress or something worse. They might make inquiries. They might look into Peter. They might even take her away, but she can’t know for sure that anything will be done. And what would the state do with her, then? Lydia thinks of cold white walls and endless screams and shudders as she turns away from the very real possibility.

 

 _I'm not crazy_ , she thinks.

 

Her fingers run over the voice recorder, a cool piece of plastic that has the power of one man’s life in its grip.

 

Lydia thinks about who she was before this and wonders how much of him has bled into her decision to do this, to manipulate him, and realizes there is more of him in her than she is ever likely to admit.

 

-

 

Two weeks later, she awakens in the middle of the night because the floorboards here creak, and Lydia hears it out in the hallway. Curiosity gets the better of her, and she leaves her bed to check outside the door.

 

She sees Peter in the hallway, heading towards Erica’s room.

 

Something spikes in her heart, and Lydia makes a split decision. She hurries out of her room without a robe and calls out across the hall, “Uncle Peter!” When he stops and looks back at her, there is surprise written on his face as if Peter hadn’t expected to see her.

 

“Lydia,” he says. She hears it plainly in his voice, too. “You’re awake.”

 

“I couldn’t sleep,” she says, her voice sounding foreign to her own ears. She feels a chill settle along her bones. If it means protecting Erica, then she’ll do it. “This place. Being somewhere new.”

 

Peter looks sympathetic. Lydia doesn’t know why he is here, in the hallway, just moments ago walking towards Erica’s room. Erica has made it plain that she is Lydia’s friend, that she wouldn’t do something to hurt Lydia, and Erica doesn’t know what Lydia knows. Erica doesn’t know that anything has changed between them. But is that what he intended, going to her room in the middle of the night?

 

While Peter has never forced himself on Lydia before, not like that, she still has to wonder—would he treat Erica the same way? Every time they were intimate, it was never something that she didn’t want to happen. It was never something that she didn’t allow. Lydia never said _no_ and had him completely disregard her. She remembers once telling him she didn’t want to, and he gave her a look and left. Just like that, he was gone.

 

Peter’s hand is on her shoulder. _When did he cross the hall?_ Lydia feels as though she is an outsider in her own body as of late, incorporeal to the events around her until he touches her and brings her back to life.

 

“Are you having bad dreams?” he asks. It’s a simple enough question.

 

“Yes,” Lydia whispers. She doesn’t know what else to say. Peter nods his head. He takes her by the hand then, and she feels him leading her across the hall. To his room. Not hers. Lydia doesn’t feel the panic hit her until he escorts her inside, releases her hand softly, and closes the door behind her. Her eyes are locked on the bed in front of her, the dark wooden frame and pristine white sheets and blue blankets and, suddenly, she can’t breathe. Bile rises up in her throat. Both of his hands are on her shoulders now, and he feels her shaking.

 

“Lydia, are you okay?” He turns her to face him, puts his hand under her chin to lift it until their eyes meet, and Lydia can’t lie this one out.

 

She shakes her head, the tears falling, as his face blurs in her vision and she can’t make out his expression any longer. “No,” she whimpers, shaking her head more vigorously. “No, I’m not okay—”

 

Peter pulls her into his arms and hugs her, cradling Lydia’s head to his chest. He settles his chin just above her forehead, one hand running gently over her hair as the other runs up and down her back. Lydia thinks of those same hands covered in blood, leaving smears of it all over her where he touches. She thinks about all the times she let him have her and wonders which hand he used to kill her uncle. Was it the same hand he is using now to comfort her? The same hand he touches her with to get her off?

 

She needs to kiss him, but she can’t. She can’t do it.

 

She’s sobbing, and she didn’t even realize it. Peter shushes her and starts to rock her, and then he kisses her forehead. “You’ve been through a lot, Lydia. If you get some rest, you’ll feel better. I promise.” He takes her by the hand again and leads her across the room to the bed. Lydia shakes her head, but thankfully, he isn’t looking at her when she does it.

 

“Here, lay down,” Peter says, and he helps her into his bed and pulls the covers up to her chest. He runs his fingers over her temple and kisses her there, closing his eyes as he does so. When he leans back to walk away, Lydia catches his hand in panic. She can’t have done all this to still have him walk away from her. _Stay here_ , she thinks fervently. _Don’t go to Erica_.

 

The words almost stick in her throat. “Please don’t leave,” she croaks. Her eyes water up again, blurring his face. “Please.”

 

After a beat, Peter makes his way around the bed and climbs in beside her. Lydia doesn’t move. He puts his arm around her waist and pulls her close, and she has to fight back the feeling of trying to crawl out of her skin. Peter doesn’t kiss her, though. His hand doesn’t wander any lower or any higher. Lydia feels his warm breath wash over her cheek and turns to it to face him, wrapping her arm around him, too. She buries her face beneath his chin and places her hand over his neck. Taking a deep breath to work up the courage, Lydia lifts herself to kiss him softly on the lips.

 

Peter responds at first until there’s a hitch in her throat, and he pulls back.

 

“Lydia,” he says softly, using his fingers to comb her hair behind her ear, “I don’t feel comfortable doing that with you when you’re upset like this.”

 

Lydia blinks. “What?”

 

Peter sighs. He kisses her forehead and settles into a position that places her head just beneath his chin once more. He hugs her, but keeps his hands in appropriate places. “Get some sleep. I’ll be right here. Okay?”

 

Lydia can’t explain why she starts crying, but she does. She sobs like he has done the worst thing imaginable to her, and hasn’t he? She heaves in hysterical breaths that never get fully into her lungs. Her eyes burn, and her nose clogs up. And all the while, Peter just holds her and rocks her and rubs her back, and it only makes her sob harder. Her hands clutch onto him, and her nails dig into his back.

 

“I’m right here,” he says.

 

She cries and cries and cries, and all the while Peter never realizes it’s because of him.

 

-

 

The next few weeks are a little bit easier.

 

Lydia considers talking to Erica about that night, but she weighs out the dangers and decides to keep things to herself for now. It seems too soon. Erica might take offense and think that Lydia doesn’t trust her. Peter might also find out that they talked, and then he would know Lydia doesn’t trust him. There are just too many complications if she opens her mouth, so she keeps quiet.

 

She also keeps crawling into his bed at night to make sure he doesn’t go towards Erica’s room again. Nothing happens between them but sleep, and Lydia reaches a point where sleeping in the same bed as him can be comforting again and no longer scares her. Peter stops asking if she’s okay because her heart doesn’t skip a beat and betray her. She will wake up, and for a brief moment, everything will feel normal again with his arm around her waist until she remembers.

 

She always remembers.

 

Peter holds her through the night, but he never touches her, and she falls asleep easily in the warmth of his embrace and almost forgets.

 

Almost.

 

She gets used to the platonic physical contact between them, so much so that she maintains it to the point of waking up one night with Peter’s hand ghosting over the dip of her lower back beneath her gown and his lips hot on her shoulder. He isn’t on top of her, just lying beside her, but her heart still spikes. His hand stills, lifting until only a single finger remains, and he kisses her shoulder tenderly.

 

Lydia doesn’t move.

 

Peter’s hand falls away. “Is something wrong?” he asks beside her, voice low and oddly tingly in her ear. She should hate that voice. A part of her does, but Lydia feels herself responding to it as well. She shuts her eyes.

 

“No,” she says, her throat tight. “I’m fine.”

 

When his hand touches her again, this time above her gown to smooth over the ruched material on the curve of her hip—an excuse to caress her while masking it under helpfulness—Lydia jumps.

 

Peter pulls his hand away. “Something’s wrong,” he says simply.

 

It’s not demanding or accusing. For a moment, he actually sounds worried about her. That’s the worst part about it. Lydia knows he’s a liar, and he’s so good at it.

 

“Yes,” she answers quietly, “something’s wrong.”

 

He remains quiet beside her, and then, “Are you going to tell me what?”

 

 _You_ , comes the resounding echo from the back of her head, but she knows better than to say it out loud. “I’m sorry,” Lydia says, trying her best to sound sincere. She has become such a liar. “It’s hard to talk about—”

 

Peter sits up beside her, startling her. His alertness is clearly visible in his eyes. In the dark they seem to glimmer their natural shade. “Did Deucalion . . . ”

 

Lydia narrows her eyes. She has no idea what he’s talking about. “Did Deucalion what?”

 

To his credit, Peter doesn’t beat around the bush. “Did he rape you?”

 

Her eyes go wide. Of all the things for him to suspect, he suspects Deucalion did something like that to her to make her this way. Lydia shakes her head. “No,” she answers quickly.

 

“Did Ennis?”

 

“No,” she says, only realizing in retrospect that she should have said _yes_. Maybe Peter would have no longer touched her had she said it, but it’s too late to take it back now. “No,” she repeats, her voice sounding hollow. “Nothing like that.”

 

For a moment, there is silence. “Lydia, I don’t know what to do if you won’t tell me what’s wrong.”

 

Lydia can’t stop herself. She blurts it out. “What were you doing going to Erica’s room in the middle of the night?”

 

That catches him off guard. “What?”

 

Lydia sits up, facing Peter and deciding to face it head on. “That night I stopped you in the hallway, you were walking towards Erica’s room. Why?”

 

He actually looks somewhat amused that this is even an issue for her, but also a little irritated by the question. It shows in the glint of his eyes and how he stares at her. “This is about me?” he asks her.

 

“Yes,” Lydia says coldly. “Now answer the question.”

 

Peter’s eyes close off. The kindness and concern that were in them only moments ago vanish right before her, replaced with a cold wall of ice to match the tone of her voice. “You’re mad at me,” Peter says slowly, “for walking down the hallway of my own house?”

 

“You were walking towards Erica’s room.”

 

“And I suppose,” Peter continues, “that if I even bothered to tell you it’s because I was checking on Erica to make sure she was all right and still safe asleep in her bed, you wouldn’t believe me? Despite the fact that I told you Kali is still on the loose, looking for us? Wanting to _kill_ us?” Peter’s rueful smile turns bitter. “But no,” he taunts, “I should only be concerned for Lydia and anything else is a spite against you?”

 

Lydia feels herself paling at his words.

 

Peter gets up from the bed in one abrupt motion. “Go ahead,” he tosses casually over his shoulder, “get some sleep. Maybe Erica won’t die in the night and you can pat yourself on the back, but I’m sure you’ll still find a way to blame me if something _does_ happen to her.”

 

When he leaves, Lydia wishes she could take it all back.

 

She hates this, she thinks, as her eyes begin to water. She hates this more than the way he touches her when he lies beside her still. She hates the way he can make her feel with a well-placed sentence aimed right at her heart. She hates how his words have power over her as much as his physical presence, and how he makes her sound like a jealous little girl instead of the protector of her last closest friend left to her.

 

Lydia doesn’t cry, though. She finds her eyes are out of tears for her situation. It’s something, too; he has walked away from her instead of her having to pull away from him, but she won’t get anywhere with games like this. She needs to do the opposite. She needs to let him in.

 

But how does she do that again, now knowing what he’s done?

 

In her head Lydia has played the situation over and over again in different ways, never knowing how it will actually occur when she confronts Peter. He could kill her. He could kill Erica, too. He could cover every trace of what he has done, and why wouldn’t he? It’s the only thing holding her back. Lydia doesn’t know if he will want her to stick around when she knows the truth. Peter only keeps her for this game, she thinks. He pretends to be her uncle. She pretends to be his niece, but what happens when the fantasy is broken?

 

What will Peter do, then?

 

She thinks about the voice recorder stored in the nightstand and reaches for the drawer only to realize she is still in his room, not hers. For now, she reconciles that he won’t hurt her. She is safe tonight. Peter might be angry with her, but she thinks that is a good thing if it means she gets to sleep in here alone. She doesn’t know whether to believe him about Erica, but he won’t try something so soon if it isn’t the truth, not with her suspicions. He doesn’t like being caught in a lie, so if he just lied to her, he will make it the truth for now. Erica will be fine, even if Peter isn’t in here with Lydia.

 

The sheets feel colder when she lies down in them, but it doesn’t take long for the fabric to warm up to her. She listens to the silence in the house, and she wonders where Peter went off to. He didn’t leave the house, or she would have heard the door. Lydia hasn’t heard any doors. The couch, she thinks, or if he’s too proud to sleep on that, maybe he went to her bedroom to borrow it for the night. She hears him rummaging in the kitchen a few minutes later and turns onto her side away from the sound, closing her eyes as she decides to stop focusing so hard on what Peter is doing and think about herself for once.

 

The problem is the two things are so intertwined now. To take care of herself, she feels she has to know everything that he is doing. His actions affect her. There are always consequences to the decisions he makes, and he makes her the center of all of them.

 

Lydia wonders, for the hundredth time, what sort of plans he had always in store for her since the beginning—and how quickly they have all gone awry. Peter bit her, but she didn’t change. How frustrated that must have made him. He stalked her, murdered her uncle, and became close to her, all for the opportunity to stake a claim on her. A claim that never came full circle. But if he wanted her so badly, he wouldn’t kill her, would he?

 

Though Lydia has been afraid of what he might to do her these past few weeks, she thinks about it in her newfound calmness and realizes it seems preposterous for him to go that far, even in anger. Peter wouldn’t have spent all of this effort to get her only to murder her, too.

 

Her only real fear is that he thinks he owns her.

 

_I will take you anywhere I please._

 

She is certain he thinks that.

 

Lydia takes a deep breath and lies on her back, looking up at the ceiling. In a few days, she’ll make up for this fight. She’ll find a way to get past his lying defenses and get him to admit to the truth.

 

And she’ll record every second of it.

 

 


	16. Safe Behind Your Veneer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _You played your part in this._  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **A/N:** Remember that tag, Pseudo-Incest? Well, this chapter plays heavily on some incest/age kink. More graphic than anything previously in this story. They're not actually related, but still. It's very heavy here. If you weren't grossed out by it before, you shouldn't be grossed out by it here. But you never know. If you want to skip this chapter, it is a smutty chapter, but it serves a higher purpose. Lydia is manipulating Peter and wrapping him around her finger by making him think he has her wrapped around his finger. Depending on your point of view, this chapter may or may not contain elements of dub-con. Lydia initiates and pushes the events, through no coercion or force directly from Peter, but there is an element of fear and necessity she feels in doing so.

_* * *_

 

Lydia sidles up behind Peter to take up the small opening between Peter’s back and the sofa, wrapping her arms around his waist and settling her legs on either side of him. She’s flush against his back, her cheek resting between his shoulder blades. He stills for a moment, unsure and taken aback by the sudden affection after the level of withdrawal and cold shoulder she has been giving him lately.

 

“I’m sorry,” she says in a light voice, turning until her nose is touching his back instead of her cheek. “For how I’ve been acting lately.”

 

Peter is silent, but she feels him relax beneath her. She can read him, too, if she is close enough like this. He believes her. _Good_ , she thinks, smiling and nudging her nose against his shirt. It’s a playful gesture like she used to do with him.

 

It does the trick. Peter notices it, and he relents further, loosening completely like an unraveled thread at her touch. “It’s all right,” he tells her. Lydia feels his hand reach out for one of the arms she has wrapped around his waist. After a moment of silence, he says, “I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”

 

Lydia wonders if he means it. She can’t read that one. “I haven’t been myself. It’s no excuse, but—”

 

“No, it’s okay,” Peter insists, half-turning to face her. She feels more vulnerable with his eyes on her, less like her mask works, but Lydia doesn’t notice a change in his eyes when he looks at her. “I’ve been trying to do what’s best for you,” he says, softer than before, “but sometimes I forget that I’m trying to be two things at once.”

 

Peter caresses her cheek with his thumb. It weakens her resolve. Sometimes he really has her believe that he cares for her.

 

Lydia knows what he means without him having to say it. He was never related to her in any way that mattered, though. Back then, Peter had been the man who had married her aunt. It would’ve made him her uncle by marriage, but it didn’t make him anything else. She never grew up with him either, so when he showed up in that police station in Beacon Hills, he was a complete stranger to her.

 

Attraction came easily that way.

 

Peter took her in, and he took care of her. He held her when she cried, listened to every sob without complaint, made sure she was fed, and watched out for her on the sidelines of his peripheral vision. Lydia grew attached to him, and that let her entertain other ideas. She was discovering her sexuality. She had messed around with a few boys, but he was a man and she wanted someone who knew what he was doing without having to be told.

 

Peter was easy on the eyes, and he was gentle with her. He saw her at her worst and wanted to help, not roll his eyes and walk away like boys her own age. Peter was everything they were not.

 

It all started with her peeking through his door, catching him in various states of undress when he wasn’t paying attention. She liked knowing what was beneath his clothes. She used the mental images to her advantage whenever she touched herself until she got the courage to seek out the real thing. That hadn’t been easy. Lydia wasn’t sure if Peter would reciprocate, but she had a suspicion that he was attracted to her, so she flaunted herself in front of him. There were risks, though. Risks that he might not like it. Risks that it might ruin everything, so she tempted him to see if he would bite, but she never threw herself at him.

 

It wasn’t until Lydia came down one day in the smallest one-piece lingerie that she could find and Peter saw her in it, and suddenly, he got up to leave the room that it struck her something was off. Lydia asked where he was going. _To shower_ , he said.

 

That was the same morning she caught him jerking off in the shower.

 

Truth be told, Lydia thinks she still had a hand in manipulating Peter as well. He didn’t know about any of those things, and she played on them to get in his bed. He probably thought all the while she was just following hormones, not actively trying to fuck him. When she consciously made the decision to crawl into his bed, he didn’t disappoint. Reality was better than her fantasies. He didn’t talk her into sex. They fooled around at first: he fingered her, he went down on her, she went down on him, but he never asked for sex. He let her make that decision when the time was right for her.

 

It was part of the reason why her attachment to him had grown so strong: he was nothing if not accommodating. Lydia played it off, of course, but she had feelings for him. She used frank language with him because she didn’t want him thinking she was in love with him. She wasn’t, of course, in love with him, but Lydia also didn’t know exactly what they were doing. She didn’t know what they were to each other. It was messy and complicated, but she wanted it, so she kept pushing further with him. They kissed sometimes almost shyly in the dark, fucked on the dinner table with half their clothes still on and the food still out, and she folded herself into him at night when she went to sleep in his arms.

 

And then he promised her a gift, and tore his teeth into her side.

 

The gift never came, only blood oozing from the wound and a sense of betrayal and broken trust that no kind word could fully mend. That wasn’t the worst part. Lydia didn’t pass out after the bite. She was still awake, lying in pain as she cried in silence, naked and vulnerable, and Peter rolled onto his back to lick his lips, which glistened with her blood.

 

It’s an image she’ll never forget.

 

She thought he meant to kill her right then. She thought he might have his way with her first when he leaned over her, brushing her hair, the blood on his lips as his eyes roved over her face. “ _Shh_ ,” he had said, “ _it’ll all be over soon_.” His thumb ran along her cheek, and she couldn’t breathe. She had thought he meant her life, not her pain, and then she passed out.

 

She woke up eventually, dressed in a nightgown, as Peter hovered over her and checked her temperature like nothing was wrong. She fought him at first, even if she was too weak. She rolled away from him, crying, trying to get off of the bed, but Peter hauled her back. He shushed her and played with her hair, touched her wound and drew out the pain for her, even though she didn’t understand at the time that was what he was doing.

 

He had convinced her once that he genuinely cared for her. After she had tried to manipulate him, but lost her courage. After she met Jackson and tried to distance herself from Peter, but found that her feelings for him were still there.

 

When she discovered he was a werewolf, everything had started to make sense. Lydia began to see the world through his eyes, and his bite made sense to her.

 

For a time, Lydia even thought maybe she loved him. Maybe she loved him, and maybe he loved her. Maybe.

 

Maybe. _Maybe_.

 

Sitting here with him now, remembering everything between them, Lydia feels a nervous flutter enter her chest. Her face heats up at the memories. She swallows past a catch in her throat and leans her cheek into the touch of his palm, rolls her hips against his back. His pupils grow wider, darkening his eyes.

 

“You’ve been taking care of me a lot in one way,” Lydia murmurs, meeting his eyes, “but you’ve forgotten all about the other . . . ” She turns until her lips catch on his thumb. _It’s just sex_ , she tells herself. _It can be fun_. _It doesn’t mean anything_. It is a means to an end, but she can enjoy it. There is no reason why it should be a chore for her.

 

“You haven’t wanted to,” Peter reminds her when she pulls away. Lydia glances up. She closes her eyes as he runs the back of his knuckles along her cheek. “And you’ve been through so much, Lydia . . . ”

 

Lydia knows that part isn’t genuine. She hears the manipulation beneath his kind words because Peter thinks she’ll give in more easily to the kindness. Well, two can play at that game.

 

She can use him, and it will mean nothing. It changes nothing.

 

Her hands hold his face, and she leans in close. “I know,” Lydia whispers, licking at his lips. She catches his bottom lip between her teeth, biting down softly. The bite turns into a kiss as he tilts his head and presses in for more. She pulls back after only giving him a small taste. “And I’ve worked up such an appetite,” she murmurs, running her hand over his chest.

 

Lydia feels his breathing quicken beneath her palm and smiles, biting her lip. He reacts perfectly to her. Now that she is over her fear, she finds her heart pounds for different reasons at the close proximity. It’s hard, not touching him. Her hand continues to run along his chest of its own accord.

 

Peter wraps his arm around Lydia’s waist and pulls her into his lap. Now face to face, Lydia settles her legs on either side of him as he pulls her closer by the hips. He kisses her, and she kisses him back. Lydia feels his hand slip underneath her hair, holding her firmly at the back of her head. She drowns in the touch of his lips, opening her mouth and letting him in.

 

With each kiss shared between them, she imagines fresh blood on his hands. She pictures it smearing over her skin, her clothes, her hair. Everywhere he touches her, blood follows in his wake, but it has the opposite effect. She is wetter with each thought, and the heat pools low between her legs. Lydia wants to ask _what’s wrong with me_ , but it’s not a question she really wants the answer to anymore. An urge to cry hits her, but it only lasts for two seconds; her body trembles in shock, and then it passes, and she moans against his mouth. With an arm looped about Peter’s neck, she pulls him down to the sofa, opens her legs, and lets him settle in between them.

 

She shouldn’t want this. She shouldn’t want him, not in any way at all. He killed her uncle. He’s been lying to her this whole time. She _knows_ that. Peter didn’t kill her parents, but he still killed someone.

 

The reality of their situation does not deter her.

 

Peter slips his hand just under the hem of her shirt and runs his fingers along the elastic waistband of her pants. He teases her with light touches, crooking a finger underneath it and sliding it sideways to ghost his finger across her skin, but he doesn’t slip a hand into her pants. Lydia rolls her hips forward, still kissing him, as encouragement. She remembers that they’ll have to use a condom this time, though, and she pulls back from him.

 

“Condom,” she whispers. “Do you have one?”

 

Peter looks confused, so she explains.

 

“My birth control is out,” Lydia says. “We can’t unless you have one.”

 

Realization dawns in his eyes, and Peter pulls off of her. “I’ll go get one,” he tells her. He stops to lean in and give her a lingering kiss before he disappears down the hall. It’s the truth, but Lydia would insist on a condom without it. Ever since she saw him walking towards Erica’s door in the middle of the night, she realizes she doesn’t know where he has been or what he does when she isn’t there.

 

Erica isn’t here today. She’s probably off messing around with her latest boy toy herself.

 

Lydia rolls her head to the side and glances over the edge of the sofa. After a few minutes, Peter returns, and Lydia gazes up at him. She raises her knees but keeps her legs closed, tilting them slightly and giving him a coy look. If he wants what is in between, he’s going to have to work for it.

 

Peter settles onto the sofa. He looks expectantly at her, and Lydia raises her hand to her breast to run it over her shirt, touching herself and biting her lower lip as she moans and their eyes meet. He parts his lips as he watches her, and he seems perfectly content with just enjoying the view for now. Lydia runs her hands over both breasts, spreading her legs as they wander down and graze over her thighs. She slides them back up her body and pops a finger into her mouth, sucking on it as she locks gazes with him.

 

When her hand travels down her body again, she slips it into her pants and rubs her wet index finger over her clit. Lydia closes her eyes and thrums at it, arching into her own touch, and feels Peter’s hands roaming over her legs and along her thighs. Lydia ignores his hands and keeps touching herself, even as she feels his forearms press into the sofa on either side of her hips as he settles in place above her. His fingers curl underneath her waistband, pulling it down, and she feels his mouth on her tummy, kissing the bare skin he reveals.

 

He gets them down past her ass and pulls them upward, but then he lets them go and braces his hands against her thighs to push her legs to her. His mouth covers her, kissing her intimately, suckling on the sensitive nub, and his tongue laps at the moisture in between, and Lydia tilts her head into the cushion to moan aloud at the ceiling.

 

His thumbs lightly graze her inner thighs as his mouth makes quick work of her. Lydia feels herself become lightheaded, and then he dips his tongue inside her, and she starts crying out as he tongue-fucks her. She feels him get a finger inside of her. Slowly, he thrusts it in and out, sucking on her clit as he circles it around inside her. She moans again, and then he gets two fingers in. She gasps. He gets three fingers in, gently spreading them inside of her, and Lydia swears up at the ceiling as heat brands her cheeks and makes her face burn and she bears her hips down onto his hand.

 

Peter chuckles against her skin, pumping them slowly in and out. “You like that, don’t you?” he says, and he bites her thigh. She expects him to stop there, but he goes one step further. “You’re a dirty, dirty girl,” he tells her, and Lydia feels her face burn hotter. He licks her clit, sending a pleasant bolt throughout her nerves to distract her. “You like having my fingers deep inside of you, spreading you wide open—”

 

Lydia pulls back from him, scrambling upright on the sofa. She slaps him as soon as he lifts his head from between her legs, and Peter doesn’t swear, but he does touch the side of his face where her hand cracked loudly between them.

 

Peter flexes his jaw carefully, widening his eyes. “Do you mind telling me what _that_ was for?”

 

“That was degrading,” Lydia says to him, her cheeks flaring with heat. Her eyes burn. Were things different, she thinks, she might have found it arousing, but his voice only seems to taunt her now.

 

He looks confused, but also mildly wary. “I thought you liked it,” Peter says, not comprehending the difference.

 

“It was the way you said it,” Lydia explains, feeling her eyes water. She glances away from him and wipes her eyes, hearing Peter sigh. He shifts closer to her on the sofa, and she realizes her pants are still down past her thighs. Peter probably thought he was being adventurous, trying something new, but he should’ve had the sense to ask first. Lydia feels him put an arm around her shoulders, his hand resting on one.

 

“Okay,” he says slowly, “that was a bad idea.”

 

Lydia knows him, and yet she asks anyway. “Aren’t you going to apologize?”

 

Peter has a comeback for that. “Are you going to apologize for slapping me?”

 

She bites the inside of her cheek hard. She wants to fight him on this, but Lydia isn’t sure how far the boundaries can be pushed until she unintentionally pushes him away. Things have been too delicate between them lately, and she doesn’t want to ruin her plans this soon, this easily, over something so small.

 

She takes a deep breath, ignores her pride, and looks up to face him. She runs her fingers along the side of his face and leans up to kiss him.

 

Peter responds slowly, favoring a careful approach to her this time. Lydia prefers it this way. She cups his face with both hands to pull him down to her, sustaining the languid pace between their lips. Eventually, he lays her on her back beneath him once more and eases her out of her pants. Their mouths part, and Peter dips down to kiss her chin, her cheek, her jaw, and then lower, to her neck. He runs his hand over her hip, her thigh, and returns those lips to her mouth to kiss her.

 

His hand slips between her legs and rubs lower, dipping into her moisture and spreading it over her. Lydia moans softly, the sound drowned by his lips against hers as he rubs gentle circles into her. Her hips rock into his hand to increase the pressure. She hates herself for it.

 

She hates herself for enjoying it.

 

Briefly, she thinks of stopping—because she doesn’t think he deserves it, because this is her tool, her game, but Peter won’t care if she uses him, he won’t care at all as long as she’s hot, wet, and willing—and then his thumb grazes at her just right and she jolts as a fine shock of pleasure shoots through her lower body. Lydia releases a soft moan, only spreading her legs further for him.

 

Peter hums delightfully in response, and a heat crawls up into her cheeks again, though for very different reasons this time. If he wants to make a game of it, then maybe she can think of something she can tolerate.

 

“Uncle Peter,” Lydia whispers, affecting her best baby voice, “I need you to take care of me.”

 

Peter pauses, hand and all, and pulls back to stare at her. Lydia can see in his eyes that she’s taken him off guard. While the moment is fresh, she clutches his shoulders and grinds down onto his hand.

 

“Please, Uncle Peter, I want to feel good—”

 

He makes a strained noise in his throat and leans in quickly to her neck, kissing as his fingers work more vigorously against her. Lydia feels his erection through his boxers, hot next to her bare thigh. While it might have terrified her a few days ago, she feels differently about it now. It feels powerful, getting him to react like this to her. She’s barely even touched him, and he’s as hard as a rock. “Yes, Uncle Peter, make me feel _go_ —”

 

He dips two fingers inside her, and Lydia gasps. He moves to her ear, biting and nibbling softly. His tongue darts out, and she feels her eyes roll back.

 

“How good do you want to feel, hmm?” Peter asks her, voice low against her ear. His fingers slide in and out with a curl, palm pressed to her clit. Lydia bites her lip, only partially suppressing her moan.

 

“You said you’d teach me,” she whispers innocently, feigning ignorance. “I don’t know what to do . . . ”

 

“ _Fuck_ ,” he swears. Peter removes his hand from her, crawling down her body to pick up where he last left off. With his hands on her thighs, his mouth descends on her and makes sure to taste every inch of her. She tilts her head back, gasping, and reaches above her head. Lydia uses the arm rest as leverage, pushing against it to grind down onto his face.

 

“Oh god, yes, Uncle Peter, make me feel good, make me your good little girl—”

 

His fingers press harder into her thighs, hard enough to brand, as he holds Lydia down and delves his tongue inside her. She struggles between suppressing each sound he invokes in her or letting it go, letting him hear it, and she chooses with letting him hear it when she no longer has the willpower to swallow it down. He gives her exactly what her body wants, so she can’t help herself; she grinds down on his face again, but Peter doesn’t care. He doesn’t let up, and neither does she, and she rides his face almost to her peak—but Peter takes it away before she can find it.

 

Lydia comes down slowly from the high, feeling disconnected from her body.

 

She focuses on the ceiling coming into view, her eyelids fluttering, as she realizes he has pulled away from her. She looks up, feeling cold, until he’s sitting upright between her legs and pulling off his shirt. He eases her upright and helps her out of her own t-shirt, kissing her chest as his fingers graze lightly over her skin.

 

She hears the foil rip before she sees it between his teeth; the condom, the one she insisted on, and Lydia feels more bare than she did before and oddly cognizant of the pulse beating between her legs, the way he’s settled between them because she has them on either side of his body, and how close he is—

 

She watches him slide the condom on, and then he kisses her again. Lydia feels light-headed as he lays her down on her back, and she grips his shoulders as she meets his eyes, feigning a childlike fear. “Uncle Peter,” she whispers, her fingers digging deep, “what if it’s too big?” Her eyes dip low, glancing between them as she bites her lip. Lydia gulps for effect, pulling her knees closer to her chest, and reaches down to skim her fingers around the base of his cock where the rubber meets his skin. “I wanna be your good little girl,” she pleads. “I wanna take it all, but I’m so tiny, Uncle Peter—”

 

A strangled sound fills his mouth before he catches her lips in a heated kiss, her lips falling pliant beneath his as she feels him edge closer and line up with her.

 

“You’ll be good,” he manages to say. “I know you will—”

 

He pushes, his cock sinking into her and stretching her with a pleasant ache. She gasps; he moans, perhaps one of the first times she has ever heard him like this. Lydia hasn’t had his cock in her for weeks; his fingers aren’t the same. She feels full.

 

“Uncle Peter, you’re too big—”

 

She strokes his ego on purpose; he grunts desperately in response, his first thrust not as elegant as it could be.

 

“Ooh, you’re too big, I can’t—I _can’t_ —” Lydia says it breathlessly, with a hint of longing, just to make sure he realizes it’s all for show. Her hand grasps the back of his head, and Peter kisses her, desperately sweet despite the circumstances of their little game.

 

“Yes, you can,” he coaxes against her lips. “Just relax . . . ”

 

He kisses her again, and then his mouth trails down her jaw to her chest, fingers finding hers, intertwining their hands together. When he slides into her this time, Lydia moans deeply, tilting her head back in the cushion. She rolls her hips into his, arching her back.

 

“Am I doing good, Uncle Peter?” she asks, still breathless.

 

He barely gets the words out, shuddering as he thrusts again. “Fuck—yes—”

 

Lydia lets go of his hand and reaches up to grip his shoulders, grinding her hips up to his. She meets his eyes with a hooded gaze. “Am I your good little girl?”

 

His mouth is open, eyes dark with desire. “Yes—”

 

Her voice lowers an octave, fingers gripping against the nape of his neck. “Make me your good little girl, Uncle Peter, make me your good little girl—” she begs. “Yes, yes, I wanna be your good little girl—”

 

She begs with every thrust of his hips until he is fucking her to the point of mild discomfort, a dull ache developing deep within. His weight is not quite crushing, but it is a little suffocating, and every breath from her lungs takes effort. When he maneuvers her legs over his shoulders and bends closer to her, Lydia bites down on her lip to prevent from screaming, but it doesn’t stop the little strained noises she makes as he pounds into her.

 

Eventually, he works harder, and she gives up trying to hold back. She slips her hand between their bodies and brings herself to an overwhelming completion as he fucks her, their breaths lined up perfectly with each other as Peter steals a kiss and Lydia shudders and comes and comes and comes, pressing down on her clit as his cock sinks in to fill her up.

 

He comes a moment later in a violent shudder, the sound escaping him absolutely primal in its nature, and then he collapses against her, his face buried in her neck.

 

Lydia still feels the tremors passing through him.

 

She tries to regain her breath. Admittedly, it’s hard with him on top of her. Peter is not an overly tall or wide-built man, but he is a decent height and she is much smaller than him. Lydia glances over at the door. She blinks dazedly and hopes Erica doesn’t choose this moment to come home.

 

“We should get up,” she suggests softly. “Erica could come home—”

 

Peter wedges himself in the corner between her and the sofa, gets an arm around her waist, and maneuvers her on top of him. Lydia looks down at him, her loose hair falling onto his bare chest. Down on his back underneath her, he looks more innocent this way. Lydia draws in a trembling breath.

 

His hand reaches up to caress the side of her face. “I’ve missed you,” he says.

 

Lydia’s eyes scan his face. She tries to find the lie, the pretense, and gulps. There isn’t one. His eyes are hazy but honest, his expression sincere. But he could have missed any number of things about her, not necessarily her. Maybe he missed the way she used to be pliant and amenable; Peter certainly hasn’t liked the way she has been acting lately.

 

No, this is what he wants: delicate, moldable, compliant Lydia. Lydia who smiles serenely as she bends down to suck his cock.

 

Despite her initial slip, Lydia doesn’t want to show weakness. She smiles at him, cocking her head, and leans down to kiss him. It was meant to be a quick peck on the lips, but Peter holds her head and kisses her slow and soft, his lips lingering a moment too long afterwards. This is all that matters, though. He trusts her again. This was all she needed from him tonight.

 

As long as he trusts her, wants her, she won’t have to fear retaliation, she thinks.

 

Lydia can set the recorder to tape their conversation when she confronts him, but if Peter feels like she’s a loose end or too much trouble or not worth the fight, he might kill her, and then her recording will mean nothing. No one will receive it. No one will find it. Her body will disappear somewhere deep in the woods, and Peter will go on with his life, a free man.

 

But with this, she has a fighting chance. It will confuse him, why she chose to still sleep with him despite knowing what he’s done. Lydia knows he will bring it up. He will narrow his eyes, tilt his head, and ask _why_ with this knowing look in his face. Like he knows something of value. Something she doesn’t know. _You have feelings for me_ , he’ll say, and he’ll think he can use them against her to his advantage. Maybe he’ll even think she likes it: the danger, the darkness. It’s not a total lie. Some part of her does, though it’s a part she hasn’t fully acknowledged yet.

 

Lydia thinks of something else. She almost doesn’t do it. Maybe it’s going too far, and he’ll realize it. He’ll know she’s up to something.

 

She touches his face, too. She pulls back from their kiss and gazes in his eyes, her fingers playing tenderly along his cheekbone.

 

“I love you,” she says.

 

Peter goes still beneath her. No movement, no acknowledgment in his eyes that he even knows what a phrase like should mean to a person. For a brief moment, Lydia fears it was a mistake.

 

Then, she feels his fingers ghost her cheek. They slip to the nape of her neck, wind in her hair, and he pulls her down to him. His other arm wraps around her back, and he holds her close, their cheeks pressed side to side, her breath coming out ragged beside his ear.

 

“I’ll always take care of you,” he says, and Lydia realizes it was no mistake at all.

 

 


	17. Volte-face

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> _[volt-fahs] **noun.** 1\. a turnabout or a reciprocal action; the act of doing to someone exactly as that person has done to oneself or another._  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **WARNING:** This final chapter comes prefaced with some warnings previously not needed for the overall story. The list includes fetishism of murder, punishment fetish, and rape fantasy. For further clarification, there is an intense encounter between Peter and Lydia that results in these things. The murder fetishism is Peter boasting about a murder during sex, the punishment fetish involves a belt as well as choking, and the rape fantasy isn't planned but happens with Lydia initiating it and Peter going along with it. And yes, there's a reason for why she does it. Those same dub-con elements from the last chapter play in here as well, but it becomes up to the individual's point of view as Lydia is still attracted to Peter, still wants to stay with him, and she more or less does what she does here just to gain control over him to become the dominant one.

_* * *_

 

“You have to let me finish this on my own,” Lydia says. “This is mine to finish.”

 

“Lydia,” Allison argues, nearly dropping her jaw, “he’s a _monster_.”

 

“ _I_ can control him,” Lydia tells her friend calmly. She doesn’t want to leave room for argument with how she says it. She needs them to know that she is capable of this. “Your plan will only set him on the run, and who will he hurt, then, huh? Another innocent person, Allison? Is that what you want?”

 

“Are you sure,” Scott begins, eyebrows furrowing together, “that you can control him?” He shrugs his shoulders, looking bewildered. “How?”

 

“Scott, you are not _seriously_ considering this—”

 

“Well, what other options do we have?”

 

“Please,” Lydia interrupts, glancing between the both of them. “Don’t fight. Until two hours ago, I thought you were dead, Scott. Don’t make this reunion a wasted effort, okay? I can’t be gone too long, and I need to be getting back. But we need to make a plan first, and we need to stick to it.” Lydia gestures at herself. “I can get the information we need, but I need you and Allison to do the rest. It’ll be too suspicious if Erica helps. Peter will notice her disappearance.”

 

Allison shrugs. “Doesn’t she disappear with guys all the time?”

 

Lydia tilts her head and gives Allison a look. “Yeah, but he’ll notice if she doesn’t come back smelling like one.”

 

“Oh, gross.”

 

“Werewolf senses,” Lydia tacks on, turning to Scott. “I’ll make the copies. I need the two of you to ensure all of those copies are set up and ready to be sent to all of the people on this list—” She hands them both a separate copy. “—If anything goes wrong or I give the word or, in worst case scenario, something bad happens to me or Erica. If you lose complete contact with us and have no reason to believe we are still alive, send them out.”

 

Allison pales as she reads the list. “Lydia, my parents are on this list . . . ”

 

Scott looks up from his paper as well. “Are all of these hunters?”

 

“Yes,” Lydia says after a moment’s hesitation. “All of the known living hunters in the tri-state area.”

 

Even Allison looks shocked by the decision. “Lydia, what information will you be sending them—”

 

“That’s not important,” Lydia informs her, cutting her off, “and _neither_ of you are to listen to the tapes I make. Do you understand me? They are _bargaining_ chips. They are also a last resort if everything else fails. If they get out before that, you’ll be putting my life and Erica’s life on the line, and not necessarily by Peter’s hand. Those tapes will bring hunters. Ruthless, skilled hunters.” Lydia swallows past a catch in her throat. “Erica is a werewolf. I’m a banshee. They’ll kill us all.”

 

Allison looks like she might cry. “We can’t _trust_ all of the hunters on this list—”

 

“I know,” Lydia says calmly. “That’s the whole point of the list. It’s a fail-safe. If we can’t control Peter, they’ll make sure he’s dead.”

 

Allison looks away, wiping the tears from her eyes. The tears aren’t for Peter. She’s afraid, and rightly so, of what could happen to Lydia. What could happen to Erica. Some of the hunters on that list have reputations far more dangerous than Allison’s family, and not all of them have codes. When Lydia looks at Scott, his mouth is hanging open. He stares at nothing in particular for a moment, and then he lifts his eyes to Lydia.

 

“Are you sure about this?” he asks.

 

Lydia’s gaze is steel. “I can do this,” she says.

 

“I know you can,” Scott whispers, almost sadly, “but do you want to?”

 

That part Lydia doesn’t have an answer for.

 

-

 

Lydia passes by the window with an almost aimless strut, hand outstretched and fingertips catching on the curtains, rustling them. The sunlight shifts and sways across the shadowed walls of the den, and she drops her hand, turning around to survey the room with pursed lips.

 

She strolls over to the table in the center of the room, places her hand on it, and gazes down at the photo album, sitting shut, on its surface. Her green eyes stare, a single finger tracing along the outer edge of the thick spine. Lydia knows this isn’t going to be easy, but she didn’t come prepared for easy. Peter lied to her yet again. He told her Scott was dead, and he isn’t. Peter also said Kali was still alive. When Lydia confronted Scott with this knowledge, his face fell. _That’s true_ , Scott had said. His expression pinched in discomfort at the memory as he looked away from her. _She escaped after using me as a human shield_.

 

Lydia tries to think of and remember all the questions she needs to ask Peter, but she knows in the moment something will be forgotten. He may even derail her, a trait he has been very good at in the past. She pulls her hand away from the book and turns, a blinding flash of light hitting her eyes.

 

Peter comes in at the exact moment as she turns, sunlight flooding around him in the doorway as he walks into the den with a bag in hand. He halts momentarily at the sight of her in a snug, low-cut burgundy dress that she picked out specially for this moment. The dress is paired with a pair of strappy russet heels, her hair falling in loose curls about her shoulders.

 

Lydia beams a red lipstick smile in his direction, leaning back with her palms on the table behind her.

 

Despite the distraction, Peter keeps walking into the house. He closes the door behind himself, fetching the keys out of the lock. “You look nice today, Lydia,” he tells her offhandedly, but his eyes roam over her in appreciation as he reaches the table and puts the bag down. “Any special occasion?”

 

“Maybe,” she offers coyly, twirling a lock of hair around her finger as she tilts her head, and Peter pauses at that, too.

 

He begins pulling the items out of the bag, placing them neatly onto the table. He always does everything so neatly. So organized. She realizes she never noticed it before now, and Lydia wonders where it came from, this intense desire he has to control everything.

 

“What’s the occasion?” Peter asks, pulling out a six pack of root beer. Root beer. Her and Erica’s favorite. They both love root beer.

 

“You murdered my uncle,” Lydia says without missing a beat, and Peter drops the six pack of root beer. It slips right out of his hand and smashes on the floor by his feet, foam bubbling up and running everywhere. Lydia watches it for only a second, raising her eyes back to Peter in trepidation.

 

He straightens himself back up. He looks rattled despite an outward appearance of calm.

 

He doesn’t meet her eyes.

 

“First,” Peter says slowly, his gaze fixed on a spot somewhere ahead of his line of sight but a few inches lower, chin tilted down, “I’m responsible for your parents. Now, I’m responsible for your uncle. What’s next, Lydia?” He looks at her now, his gaze boring into her. “Did I kill all of those innocent people, too?”

 

Lydia knows what he means. Those people Deucalion killed to get to her. “Don’t talk to me like that,” she warns him.

 

His eyes glint. She sees his head turn the smallest fraction. “What?”

 

“Don’t talk to me,” Lydia says simply, leaning forward off of the table, “like I’m some oblivious child who isn’t aware of what’s going on.” She leans closer until she is in his face. “I’m not a child, and I’m twenty times smarter than you’ll _ever_ be, sweetheart.”

 

Lydia expects Peter to get angry. What she doesn’t expect is the small smile that graces his face and what comes out of his mouth next. “I never doubted that.”

 

Shock registers in her eyes for a moment, but then she pulls away from him. She grabs the photo album in the center of the table and spins it around to face them. Opening it up to her fifth birthday party, she pushes it towards him. Peter looks down at the glossy pages, a careful hand reaching out to straighten the book laid before him. Dawning fills his eyes, his gaze flitting over the pictures. It’s quiet for a long while, and then his hand falls away from it.

 

“A photo album,” Peter finally says, strangely calm. He slips a hand beneath the cover, shutting it. “Of all things, a photo album.”

 

“Did you really think I would never find out?”

 

“Honestly,” Peter tells her, his calmness beginning to unnerve her as he looks at Lydia, “I’d be disappointed if you never did.”

 

She doesn’t speak at first, feeling a chill creep down her spine. Of all the possible reactions she imagined, this wasn’t one of them. “You expected this.”

 

He gives her an appreciative look. “Predicted, more like.”

 

She asks the only thing she knows to ask. “Why?”

 

Peter cocks his head. “Why what?”

 

“Why did you murder him?”

 

Lydia thinks she can still hear the root beer fizzing, a distant buzz in the back of her ears. Peter doesn’t answer her right away, but he does stare at her, expression turning more solemn by the second. “I did it to protect you.”

 

Lydia exhales sharply. She can’t believe her ears. “ _Oh_ , so you’re a hero now?”

 

Peter makes a face, not quite smiling but definitely bemused, and begins to walk around her. “I wouldn’t go so far as to say that,” he clarifies, “but consider this: What would your life be like now if I hadn’t pretended to be your uncle then and shown up in that station the day I did to give you a home? Temporary foster care? Do you think Deucalion wouldn’t have found you there? Do you think they would have protected you better than I have? Humans? Against an Alpha who controlled a pack of Alphas?”

 

“That’s no _excuse_ —”

 

“You’d be their prisoner now,” Peter says, stepping closer to her, so close she can feel his breath on her skin. “Did you enjoy their company for the short time they had you?”

 

Lydia gulps, blinking rapidly. “No—”

 

“And your uncle,” Peter goes on, backing away from her again. “He didn’t care. He didn’t want anything to do with you. He was in the middle of trying to drink himself to death when I found him, living in a rundown shack with rats crawling across the floor. Not the picturesque man in the photo album, no. He looked like he hadn’t shaved in three years. I figured if someone like him did a little cleaning up, no one would be able to tell the difference. He was already halfway dead. I just helped speed along the process.”

 

“You’re not doing yourself any favors right no—”

 

Peter leans forward swiftly, startling Lydia; she flattens her back along the table’s edge. “And _what_ do you want? Huh? An inscrutable, morally adequate solution to the equation of a perfect life?”

 

“I didn’t want _this_ ,” Lydia hisses.

 

“Oh, as I recall,” Peter murmurs, “you wanted a lot of it. Just as much as I did.”

 

Her face flushes with warmth. “ _Fuck_ you.”

 

Peter delivers a small smile, his eyes gleaming. “Already done that, sweetheart, and I’m afraid it wasn’t much of a punishment than a reward.”

 

Lydia grits her teeth and slams a fist into his chest. Peter doesn’t try to stop her. She isn’t a match for him physically in a fight, so he lets her get away with blow after blow until she has him nearly backing against the wall, and then he changes his mind on how much he is willing to take. He snatches her wrist the next time she goes to hit him, and he grabs the other before she can use that one, too. Lydia twists in his grip, ramming her shoulder into his chest and knocking his back into the cabinet holding the dinnerware. It is not a sturdy fixture, so a few of the upright plates fall, hitting the floor and Peter. He grunts at the impact, staggering away, only to refuse releasing her.

 

“Let—me— _go_ ,” she hisses between her teeth. Peter obeys. Lydia stumbles away from him, landing on her knees as soon as his hands release her. While she never took drama classes, Lydia is master of crying on command. The tears come easily for her, and she gingerly wipes them away with the back of her hand.

 

“How did you kill him?” she asks. “How did you kill my uncle?”

 

“Oh, don’t act so torn up,” Peter tells her as he walks around her this time. “You already knew. You were just waiting to confront me.” When she sees his boots in front of her, he stills. “Which gives me ideas about our little . . . transgression the other day.” His fingers reach out for her chin. Peter places three underneath it. “I didn’t gut him, if that’s what you’re thinking.” He steps closer, and she feels his finger gently graze the side of her neck with a ticklish touch. Her nerves jolt from it. “I didn’t rip his throat out with my claws either,” he murmurs as if whispering sweet nothings in her ear. He kneels down in front of her, blunt nails in her hair. “I didn’t tear him to shreds. I’m not an animal. I may be a werewolf, Lydia, but I gave him a quick and merciful death in the end.” Peter leans in closer until she feels his lips on her ear, his hand still in her hair. “And I did it for _you_.”

 

He says it as if she should be grateful, as if she should thank him. As if her life was worth innocent blood split to keep her warm. “How does that make you any different from Deucalion?”

 

Peter’s hand falls away as he stands up again. “I’m not trying to enslave you. I’m only trying to protect you.”

 

Lydia looks up at him, meeting his gaze. “You call biting into my side against my will protection?”

 

Peter bristles at that. “I thought we agreed that was a mistake.”

 

“You _lied_ to me,” Lydia accuses, her voice trembling. “You murdered my _uncle_. You hid that you were a _werewolf_. It’s all lies, all of it. I don’t know who you are,” she adds, shaking her head. Lydia gulps, bidding the tears to come back. “I don’t even know your real _name_ —”

 

Peter kneels in front of her again. “Of course you do,” he says, touching her once more, his hand on her cheek. “Peter. Peter is my real name. Lydia, do you really think everything is a lie? Some superficial titles and backstory are made up, and everything is a lie?” He looks right into her eyes as his widen, his expression pleading. “That was my only lie, and it was done to protect _you_. I didn’t do it for the amusement of deceiving you.”

 

Lydia stares at him, letting him caress her cheek. “Peter who?” she whispers.

 

He gives the answer on cue. “Peter Hale,” he says against her lips, and the name sounds familiar to her as if she has heard it before. She knows the next part will be tricky, and she has to be careful. One wrong slip, and the whole thing will be worthless.

 

Peter doesn’t kiss her. She slips her hand behind his neck and kisses him. It’s soft and quiet at first until he groans and pushes for more, apparently turned on by the fact that she does still want him after all. That’s when Lydia makes a sound of protest and gasps as she shoves him away. It’s hard enough and unexpected enough to make Peter fall onto his back, a loud thump against the floor.

 

“ _Stop_ ,” Lydia tells him. “No—”

 

He narrows his eyes at her, confused, as he pushes himself back up into a sitting position. “Well, I guess I’m not the only liar here . . . ”

 

“Don’t touch me again.”

 

His look of bewilderment only grows. “You’re joking, right?” To her great luck, he doesn’t say _you kissed me_ out loud.

 

Lydia breathes heavy through her mouth. It escalates immediately.

 

She rushes into him to kiss him, knocking Peter to the floor again. This time with her on top of him. Each kiss is bruising, and every sound he makes is met with one from her that sounds more like protesting than pleasure, but still, Lydia rips back his jacket and pulls viciously on his shirt. Peter groans at her ferocity and pushes up, shoving Lydia onto the floor below him and mounting her waist. He tears off his jacket and rips off his belt, wrapping it around her neck.

 

That move startles Lydia, and her gasp of fear is real. Peter, however, nuzzles her cheek and only tightens it very gently with his fingers. It takes Lydia a moment to register this is sexual for him, not an attempt to end her life. When he releases a ragged breath near her ear, she lets one out as well. “Do you know how I killed him, hmm? Your uncle?”

 

“ _Please_ —” she begs, sounding as if he is hurting her.

 

Peter pulls back to look at her face, almost an edge of concern to his expression, but Lydia covers quickly. She aims a wanton look at him, biting into her lip and arching her neck, careful not to make any sounds. His expression becomes dark again at seeing her turned on by this.

 

“Not with a belt like this,” Peter goes on. “I didn’t tighten it around his neck like this—” Using his fingers, he tugs the two ends together just slightly, and Lydia’s heart beats fast as she gasps out loud. Louder than necessary, arching her back. “Oh, but you like this, don’t you? You like being punished. You like being taught a lesson, and you’ve always enjoyed a pinch of pain—” Peter lets the belt go, and Lydia gasps again, heaving in breaths she doesn’t need.

 

He lifts some of his weight from her, and Lydia turns over underneath him. She pulls herself forward, gasping when he grabs her throat and lifts her up some by it. “Trying to get away?” Peter asks, playing the game that she leads him into. He follows her like a puppy, responding to every cue.

 

Lydia lifts her eyes to him from the side, and his hand travels up to her chin until he is grasping it, and then his thumb slips into her mouth. Obligingly, she sucks on it for him, their eyes locked as his expression comes undone. Lydia arches her ass back into his crotch, against his erection; he groans, and she spreads her legs. “Ple— _ease_ —” It comes out broken around the thumb he still has in her mouth. Her voice hitches, coming out strained. “Peter _, please_ —”

 

Lydia notices his pause. His eyes are glancing down between their bodies where she had parted her legs. He lets out another ragged breath, his thumb leaving her mouth as his hand skims her throat. “Ah, keep begging,” Peter says against her hair. “You know how much I like it when you beg.”

 

She reaches behind herself, tugging upward on her dress. Peter helps her, baring her panties, and she pulls those down as best as she can using only one hand. He reaches out to touch her, finding her soaked, and moans aloud as he strokes her gently. Lydia makes a noise somewhere between a whimper and a wheeze. Peter doesn’t seem to notice or care about the sound because she arches into his touch.

 

He lets go of her neck to get his pants undone, and she gasps again as if she can’t breathe. A resounding slap fills her ears as she pinches her eyes shut, feeling his hand strike her ass; she jolts with pleasure, but cries out in a way that sounds like pain. He does it again with the same result. Two or three strokes behind her, and he lines himself up and nudges against her slickness. Lydia realizes she can’t tell him to use a condom. He doesn’t seem to remember. It’s the only thing she hasn’t accounted for. The most she can do is hope he remembers to pull out on time.

 

He pushes into her without protection, and Lydia screams aloud. There isn’t any pain; it feels good—the depth, the angle, they’ve never done it like this. She bites down hard on her lip and rocks back to meet his shallow thrusts. His hand finds her throat again, clamping around it and giving him leverage to hold her place as he fucks her. “Do you know how I did it?” he says, breathless. “Suffocation.” It’s sexual for him, telling her the details while he has his cock inside her. He kisses her ear, then shoulder. “I didn’t strangle him. I might crush something. Leave behind evidence. No, I did it the old-fashioned way. Held a pillow over his face. Until his breath gave out.”

 

His teeth bite her softly through the material of her dress. Lydia can’t explain it; it should horrify her, and part of it does, but she is also turned on more for it. She makes a whine low in her throat and chokes back a sob that isn’t really there.

 

“—And you don’t care,” Peter adds. “You don’t care at all. I buried his body in the woods. In one piece. Not far from his backyard. Dug a hole, dropped him in it, and then I was on my way to see you. Do you remember, Lydia? You hugged me. _So_ glad to see me—”

 

Lydia isn’t sobbing, but she is making sounds like she is. She makes up for it by rocking harder back against his hips, ensuring Peter knows she wants this badly, even if it seems deranged of her. Peter doesn’t question her sounds; they’ve done this before, fuck rough and pay attention to body language, not words or sounds. Lydia can’t recall a situation where she had to tell him no, so they never really relied much on safe words.

 

This is normal for them.

 

Well, not all of it.

 

“No, you like this,” Peter taunts, thrusting harder. “Me fucking you as I tell you just how I killed him. You couldn’t even remember what he _looked_ like—”

 

Lydia gasps as his hand circles around her throat and tightens. His grip is harder than it was before, but his voice is softer, boarding on a whisper in her ear.

 

“Do you want me to do to you what I did to him, hmm?”

 

It isn’t hard enough to choke her, but she feels light-headed. She wheezes as she tries to breathe in, his thrusts growing more erratic yet still rough.

 

“Do you want me to? Huh?” he asks. “Do you like that? _Fuck_ —”

 

Lydia finally chokes, feeling her face flush red and hot, but she can still breathe. She hits the floor with one hand, uses it as leverage as she rocks harder back into him, meeting every harsh he has to offer. It ends quick. Peter hisses, his hand disappears from her throat, and he pulls out all of a sudden. Lydia feels the hot splash of come on her ass, but she is too busy gasping to move and clean it off, heaving in deep breaths. A few moments later, she registers that he has climbed off of her, lying on the floor beside her.

 

The meeting hasn’t scarred her. She already knew what Peter was capable of. To hear it in so many words out of his mouth doesn’t change anything. None of it is new information, except for how he did it.

 

It was exactly what she wanted, too.

 

Peter leans over and kisses her, if possible, in a soft way. He pulls Lydia’s panties up over her hips and straightens out her dress, pulling it down to cover them.

 

There isn’t a word for what they’ve done.

 

There isn’t a word for what they’re about to do either.

 

-

 

Lydia managed to get Erica away from the house with her for a day. Usually, she is gone before Lydia can stop her, but she made sure to route herself around her friend’s schedule. They were just walking around the mall, but Lydia took her off toward the benches outside in a round alcove paved with sidewalks and planted with trees. Together, they sit down.

 

It’s been a light day so far, but Lydia has important things to talk to Erica about than boys and clothes. She glances over at her friend, squinting in the sunlight. “Can I ask you something, Erica?”

 

“Sure,” Erica says, grinning. “Shoot.”

 

“Has Peter ever hurt you?”

 

Erica pauses, raising her eyebrows. Her jaw falls loose, eyes narrowing, and she purses her lips. “What?”

 

“Has he ever hit you?” Lydia asks seriously, pushing onward. “Ever asked you to do something you didn’t wanna do? Tried to make you?”

 

Erica narrows her eyes further. “Is this a joke?”

 

Lydia bites her lip. Maybe she was wrong. She pulls out her phone and attaches a pair of ear buds to it. She has the file on her phone for Erica. The original is safe along with all of the copies, and everything is in place, but this one was made for Erica’s ears. “I have something you need to listen to. I . . . ” She pauses, her throat dry. “I don’t know how to tell you, only to show you.”

 

She hands one of the ear buds to Erica. Erica keeps giving her that skeptical look, but she takes the ear bud and sticks it in, gestures at Lydia to hit play. Lydia bites her lip, but finds the file. Presses play halfway through.

 

Erica pales. After a few moments, her mouth falls open. Eventually, she jumps, yanking the ear bud out and tossing it away from herself. “What the _fuck_ —”

 

When she gets over her shock, Erica quickly leans toward Lydia. “He did that to _you_?” She reaches out for Lydia’s arm, but hesitates. “Are you okay . . . ?” Erica shakes her head, squeezing her eyes and touching her forehead. “That’s a stupid question.” Then, her eyes open up. They flash a bright yellow. “I’ll _kill_ him,” she growls through her canines.

 

“No,” Lydia says quickly. “Please, no. I know what to do. Allison and Scott are going to help—”

 

Erica gasps. “Scott’s alive?” She grins unlike anything Lydia has ever seen from her. “Oh my god, he’s alive—”

 

Lydia tries to smile, but it’s sad. “Yeah, he’s alive.”

 

Erica’s face falls. “Peter said he was dead.”

 

“Peter said a lot of things.”

 

Erica’s face twists halfway between rage and excitement. “What do you need me to do?” she asks, sounding almost too eager.

 

Lydia’s no werewolf, but sometimes.

 

Sometimes she wonders.

 

-

 

It’s not exactly going to be a romantic evening, but Lydia laid out candles across the room and dimmed the lights down low. She set up roses in the glass vase on the table, added water, and spritzed a little bit of her favorite perfume in the air. She closes her eyes and tilts her nose up, smiling softly as she breathes it in.

 

Tonight is going to go off without a hitch.

 

She has everything planned down to the six foot in diameter round shag rug next to the door, but that’s for later, Lydia acknowledges, as she points at it and turns to face the opposite way.

 

Lydia takes a seat in the largest, plushest chair and waits.

 

Peter comes back with the takeout for the night. She hears him at the doorway, though with his heightened sight he doesn’t fumble much in the dark. “Lydia,” he calls out, “why’s it so dark?”

 

Lydia doesn’t say anything. She waits for him to find her, open wine bottle at her side and a glass of it in her hand. He pauses in the doorframe as she takes a sip of it in front of him, slow and careful.

 

“Wine,” Peter says. He looks around, shifting uncomfortably. “ . . . Candles?”

 

“Oh, right,” she says, moving to put down her glass of wine. “You were in a fire, weren’t you?” That information is thanks to Erica, who dug it up for Lydia to use against him. Her concern is false display. Her fingers touch her collarbone. “Silly me. I forgot.”

 

Peter goes still. “I never told you.”

 

Lydia leans back in her plush seat. “No, you didn’t, did you?”

 

“What kind of game is this?”

 

“A very fun one,” Lydia announces, patting her knee. “Potentially. I mean, it’s no game if everyone doesn’t get with the picture, you know what I mean?”

 

“Stop being coy and get to the point.”

 

Lydia sighs. “All work and no play makes Peter a very _dull_ boy,” she teases him. “Do you really want me to get to the point? Because the point’s a little sharp—”

 

The takeout bag falls from his grip as he advances on her, and Lydia has to think quick. She has aggravated him too soon, and she doesn’t know what he intends to do once he reaches her. Swiftly, she raises the voice recorder from the corner of the seat and holds it up. She can’t toy with him anymore. Before he tries to get his hands on her, she needs to show him who is in control here now, and it isn’t him.

 

Peter freezes as she raises her arm, staring down at the silver casing in her hand. “What’s that?”

 

“It’s a voice recorder,” Lydia says cheerfully, “and I used it yesterday during our little . . . encounter.”

 

She presses the play button before he can reply. It is the original tape, but she has already produced all of the copies she needs. All of it has been taken care of, and they are packaged and set up. Prepared to be sent out on her word, if it comes to that. Of course, she trimmed the beginning of the tape. All she really needed was his confession, and the actions that came after.

 

The sound crackles to life in the middle of Peter talking, _“ . . . body in the woods. In one piece. Not far from his backyard. Dug a hole, dropped him in it, and then I was on my way to see you. Do you remember, Lydia? You hugged me._ So _glad to see me—_ ”

 

Lydia has never the seen the look that overcomes Peter’s face on him before. His lips part ever so slightly, eyes downcast, as he takes a careful step away from her. Lydia’s sobbing rings out from the audio tape. It doesn’t sound like pleasure or a willing participant. Her cries fill the room with a haunting echo.

 

“ _No, you like this_. _Me fucking you as I tell you just how I killed him. You couldn’t even remember what he_ looked _like—”_

 

Peter shuts his eyes, flinching as he hears Lydia gasp on the tape.

 

“ _Do you want me to do to you what I did to him, hmm?_ ”

 

In the crackle of the recording, Lydia wheezes as she tries to breathe. Peter’s jaw clenches, his eyes still shut.

 

“ _Do you want me to? Huh?_ ” Behind his voice lies the sound of Lydia choking. “ _Do you like that?_ Fuck—”

 

“Turn it off,” Peter demands, though his voice wavers.

 

Lydia presses the stop button. It was different in real life. She encouraged every action and was a willing participant, even found herself enjoying it despite how horrifying it sounds on tape. It sounded like he was hurting her, raping her, even trying to kill her.

 

It only made the murder confession that much better, Lydia thinks with a smile.

 

She tilts her head to the left, giving him a narrowed stare. “Do you know,” Lydia begins, pointing at him, “what the statute of limitations on murder is, Peter?”

 

That same unrecognizable look has not left his face. “There is none,” he answers quietly.

 

“ _Correct_ ,” Lydia says, a little too chipper. She gives him a knowing, smug smile from the side. “See, I knew I’d get a confession out of you, but I didn’t think you would get so into it. It’s kind of kinky.” Lydia pauses, and then she shrugs. “But I knew your nature would win out in the end. Or at least I hoped. But you more than lived up to my expectations.”

 

Peter still looks guarded, having stepped back from her as if the shadows might help hide him. “And what makes you think I won’t destroy that tape?”

 

“Oh, sweetheart,” she declares sadly, shaking her head. “Do you actually think I would come here to confront you and not have the rest of my plan in motion?” She gingerly puts the recorder back on the seat beside her. “I’ve already made all the copies I need. I’ve already put them in place.” Lydia looks up at him, folding her hands across her knees. “It’s a murder confession. Full of graphic details of what you did and where you buried the body. Given while your abducted victim is under the duress of physical torment, sexual force, and threats of murder—”

 

“That’s _not_ what happened—”

 

“Who’s going to believe you?” Lydia asks airily, sitting back in her seat with one hand raised, twirling in her hair.

 

Peter’s fingers clench and flex outward. He repeats the motion, glancing around himself as if gauging his surroundings like a cornered animal. Lydia notices the wandering eyes, the uneven breathing, the _fear_ in him. It makes her feel powerful as she watches him react to his situation—a situation she created for him.

 

After a long moment of silence, Peter finally speaks.

 

“How much time do I have?”

 

Lydia shifts her weight onto her other thigh, furrows her brow. She stops twirling her hair. “What do you mean?”

 

Peter doesn’t meet her gaze. “How much time do I have?” he repeats. “Minutes? Hours?”

 

“Until what?”

 

“Until they’re here,” Peter says, finally looking at her. “The police.”

 

Lydia laughs, loud and clear, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “Oh, I didn’t contact the police. You’d probably kill them all.”

 

“ _Who?_ ” he demands.

 

Lydia doesn’t like his tone.

 

“Hunters,” she says smartly, and then she turns just slightly and smiles. “Every single hunter in the tri-state area.”

 

His mouth falls loose. Peter collapses to his knees on the floor. His breathing is ragged. Panic flits across his face. Lydia’s smile falls. She is beginning to question a few things now. She thought Peter might try to attack her and run for it, but he hasn’t raised a hand to her yet.

 

Instead, he has fallen to his knees like a defeated man.

 

Lydia is certain if they were on their way, Peter would rise up and fight them the second they arrived at the door. He would kill every one of them that he could until they took him down. He wouldn’t go without a fight. She knows that.

 

It’s his reaction now that surprises her.

 

Slowly, Lydia pushes herself up from her chair. “I haven’t sent them off yet,” she says cautiously.

 

Peter falls still. He glances up at her sideways.

 

“What?”

 

She crosses the distance and reaches him. Very carefully, Lydia extends her hand to his face. Wary of her, Peter pulls back, but that doesn’t stop Lydia. She places her hand in his hair and rakes her fingers gently over his scalp. “The tapes,” she explains. “I haven’t sent them off yet. But—”

 

She circles around him, her nails dragging a path from his scalp to his neck to his shoulders, to his back.

 

“—If something happens to me or Erica, they will be sent off. If I give the word, they will be sent off. If you so much as _breathe_ in a way that offends me, they will be sent off.”

 

Peter remains still on his knees.

 

Lydia reaches his front again, placing her hands on either side of his face. Tilting his head upward, she ensures they are looking directly in each other’s eyes.

 

“See, you have a choice, Peter. I can send off those tapes. I really don’t mind, but you’re useful. Resourceful. And a part of me knows it would be such a shame to let that mind go to waste.” Lydia runs one of her hands over his hair, almost in a loving gesture, until she cups the back of his head. “You see, I do want a perfect life. There are lots of things that I want, and you can help me get those things. All you have to do is everything I ask.”

 

Lydia runs her thumb over his cheek as Peter stares up at her with an unreadable expression on his face, his eyes unfathomable. He doesn’t answer her.

 

“But the first time you lie to me,” Lydia breathes out, “I send out those tapes. The first time you withhold something from me, I send out those tapes. The first time you do something that I don’t give you express permission to do? I send out those tapes.” She bends forward, leaning close to his lips. “The first time you try to manipulate me, I _send_ out those tapes.”

 

Lydia pulls back from him. “So, here’s your choice. Do I send out those tapes? Or do you submit to me and heel—” Her finger catches underneath his chin. “—like a good little pup?”

 

Lydia stares at him as she runs her forefinger along his chin. His jaw is tight, but she can feel him trembling.

 

“If you accept my offer,” she whispers, “bow your head.”

 

Peter continues to stare up at her. Lydia isn’t sure what’s going through his head. She wonders if she can do this. If she can control him. Train him. He is part man, so it won’t be easy, but he’s also part wolf. Part an animal. An intelligent animal, and even those can be trained with the right guiding hand. If she can stop him from hurting people, she can repurpose him. Find a use for his brilliant mind beyond suffering and pain and death.

 

Part of it was probably the fire, Lydia thinks. With Scott and Allison’s help, Erica went digging for information on Peter Hale. He lived a normal life until the fire. He spent four years in a coma, and then woke up. There was a trail of bodies that led to that police station in Beacon Hills, to her. He had stood there in front of her and smiled that innocent smile after killing so many people. Not all of them were innocent, Lydia knows, but her uncle was hardly his first.

 

Peter never attempted to kill her, though. Even when faced with the possibility of being fed to hunters, he accepts his fate—if it’s from her. He treated Lydia like a cub until he treated her like a mate, and even if it was all built on lies, she doesn’t think he was lying when he said he did it to protect her. In his mind maybe that part is true. It excuses none of his actions, but he won’t turn on her and that’s an advantage she can use.

 

“You know,” Peter tells her as he looks up at her. His voice is hoarse as he breaks his silence. He almost seems proud. “Of all the expectations I had for you, Lydia . . . you’ve exceeded them all.”

 

Lydia smiles at him. “I know,” she says, touching his cheek.

 

He exhales a tremulous breath and makes his decision, bowing his head to her as his shoulders slump in a non-threatening gesture of submission, and she can see through his back the unevenness of each breath he draws. Lydia runs her fingers through his hair, pulling him close to cradle his head against her body. Her arms wrap around each side, her hand running soothing strokes along his scalp.

 

“Good behavior will be rewarded,” Lydia says. “Bad behavior will be punished.” She leans down enough to kiss the top of his head. “And some days, well . . . ” She glides her fingers through his hair, nails sharp against his scalp as a warning. “Some days will be easier than others.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **A/N:** So, I did a little throwback to chapter one with that final line, which was also something said during their first meeting together. And originally, this story was meant to end with them tracking down, capturing, and killing the murderer of her parents, but then I thought, "Hey, wouldn't it be interesting if Lydia actually finds out about what Peter did to adopt her?" Resulting in this ending instead. Which I like better, though I'm sad to see this story end. Anyway, thank you all for reading, and I hope you enjoyed the ending.


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